AP Keeps Using Dubious Sources

Submitted by Tully on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 8:11am

Since the meltdown of the AP's Amazing Vanishing Burning Sunnis story, they've quit using their Amazing Unfindable Source, the "Police Captain" Jamil Hussein. Where Hussein's "money quotes" as sole named source used to appear it now just reads "police said" with no further attribution. (For anyone who missed it, the Iraqi and Baghdad authorities have stated for the record that there is no Jamil Hussein in the police force, no one but AP seems able to locate him, and they have not produced him. Michelle Malkin has the video recap for the link-challenged.)

But that hasn't stopped their use of named dodgy sourcing, as this article yesterday demonstrates. Buried towards the bottom is another large and unverified body count from one of the names tagged by CENTCOM as dubious sources whose employment and even existence have yet to be verified by CENTCOM.

Police discovered the tortured bodies of 60 people who had been bound, blindfolded, then shot and left in Baghdad over the past 24 hours, Lt. Mohammed Khayoun said.

Gateway Pundit has inquiries in to CENTCOM on this aspect of the story. So far, the "money quote" from "Lt. Khayoun" is the only report of massive body finds available, and as yet the report is unconfirmed.

UPDATE: And the beat goes on! This morning AP is using not one, not two, but THREE of the names from the "dubious source" list in an article.

Two rounds landed and exploded at 11:20 a.m. in the Haraj Market in a mixed Shiite-Sunni area in northern Baghdad, said police officers Ali Mutab and Mohammed Khayoun, who provided the casualty totals.

About 25 minutes later, a suicide bomber with explosives hidden beneath his clothing set them off aboard a bus in Sadr City, killing two people and wounding 15, police 1st Lt. Thaer Mahmoud said...

...Five minutes earlier, a roadside bomb exploded near a police patrol in east Baghdad, but caused no casualties, police Capt. Mohammed Abdul-Ghani said.

I smell a bait-and-switch. It's quite possible that some of those on the suspect-source list actually exist but are not authorized spokesmen, and the AP would like to get the focus on them and off of the Incredible Invisible Jamil Hussein. I note that Mohammed Khayoun has suffered a sudden demotion from Lt. to just "police officer" in this article, for example. "Officer" Ali Mutab seems to be making his first appearance as an AP source here, BTW.

Uh uh. We want to see the man behind the curtain. Show us Jamil Hussein!

The AP's own statement of their professional standards of journalism can be found here.

[Graphic courtesy of Jessica's Well, via Flopping Aces]

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I get the feeling

Submitted by Pat on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 10:41am.

That a memo went out from the AP to all of its "stringers" that it would now require all stories to include at least one or two quotes from named police officials. So the stringers are now just making up all sorts of names to toss into their reports.

That's the big story to me. I understand the AP not disclosing the names of genuine civilian witnesses who want to remain anonymous in the war zone. But some actual AP real reporter (not some local Iraqi stringer with dubious loyalties) ought to know those names and do some fact-checking. And there's no good reason not to name the reporters, or at least tell us whether they are legitimate, long-time AP reporters or if they are freelance stringers that they've hired recently from the local population.

"AP claims"

Submitted by Tully on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 1:08pm.

But some actual AP real reporter (not some local Iraqi stringer with dubious loyalties) ought to know those names and do some fact-checking.

They claim to have done so, but they still won't produce ANY verifiable sources for the al-Hurriya story. I'm pretty sure that some of the folks on the "dubious source" list are quite real, but not authorized to act as spokesmen. I'm also aware that some of the things they've been quoted as saying are false or exaggerated. And I'm positive some few are as "real" as Jamil Hussein--not only not authorized spokesmen, but also not what they are claimed to be, if they even exist.

At least one name on the list who was a named source in 23 separate AP articles, often alongside Jamil Hussein ("Lt. Maithem Abdul Razzaq") is reportedly being sought under a warrant for impersonating a government official. AP was notified several weeks ago by Centcom and MOI that Abdul Razzaq was not who he claimed to be--but they continued to use him and cite him as a named source anyway, complete to the rank & title attributions.

I can buy getting suckered in by faux sources and/or a rotten "Jayson Blair" stringer/reporter and not wanting to admit it. But the evidence suggests that AP intentionally ignored their sourcing problem even after being officially notified, and continues to do so. I don't have time to run the chains, but Gateway Pundit and Flopping Aces have done the heavy lifting on some of the named "reporters" who are supplying the articles, and the same ones keep using the same known bad or questionable sources today, and AP keeps running their articles. They didn't quit using Abdul Razzaq (or naming him, anyway, they may still be using him) until after the Jamil Hussein flap broke, and they'd been officially warned he was not as advertised.

HERE is the original CENTCOM press release on the Hurriya incident. It does not match at all with AP's report, which AP continues to "stand by." Heh.

There is no "out" for AP on the Hurriya story (not even the embarrassing "we wuz suckered" mea culpa) without producing Jamil Hussein. The longer they stonewall, the worse it gets for them. Their own standards say they're wrong.

Did they really claim that?

Submitted by Pat on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 1:25pm.

I understood that the AP claimed that "they" had checked on the story and gotten all these witnesses and so forth. My question specifically is who is the "they" within the AP who did that. I don't think they've said "we sent in John Blow, one of our top reporters, to verify this story, and found it accurate". The details of how they "verified" the story have not been disclosed, have they?

Ben Bradlee knew the secret identity of "deep throat". Who at the AP knows the identity of their witness sources? Who exactly at AP has had many conversations with "Captain Jamil Hussein"? I don't see nearly the compelling need to keep the reporters' identities a secret, if they are westerners. At any rate, there is no reason to hide from us whether it was regular AP reporters who did all the interviews and verifications or whether it was Iraqi stringers.

They say they sent "AP

Submitted by Tully on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 1:35pm.

They say they sent "AP reporters" (unnamed) into Hurriya who found new anonymous witnesses who supported their story. I can walk up the street and find folks who will happily say that Elvis lives here and that the Mayor once assaulted their gerbil--if I don't name them. Or I could just make it all up, with equal verifiability. That is, none.

IOW, their "confirmation" is even less supported and verifiable than the original article. They refuse to name the reporters or the purported witnesses.

The Centcom report would have to be comletely false for the AP story to have any support, past the Molotov attack on the one mosque. Note that the Iraqi patrol arrived while the mosque fire was in progress, within minutes of the Molotov, and remained through the fire team's arriving and putting out the fire. No burning Sunnis were noted. You'd think they'd be kinda noticeable. In fact, no casualties at all were noted, and that's one thing the Iraqis aren't shy about reporting.

ALL of the rest of the story appears to be whole-cloth fabrication. TIME, NYT, even al-Jazeera were unable to confirm anything past the mosque fire (without casualties), yet AP "stands by their reporting."

My question is who are the "AP reporters"

Submitted by Pat on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 1:41pm.

Are they "real" AP reporters (i.e., Western), or are they local stringers on contract to the AP? I mean, that's in addition to all the immense problems you and Gateway and the others have noticed. But I'm not even convinced that the "AP reporters" sent to "verify" the story even bothered to go out into the field and find those crazy people you mention. The reporters sent to "verify" the story may have been the same reporters who did the reporting to begin with, or just other Iraqi stringers harboring an agenda.

Exactly. AP won't say! They

Submitted by Tully on Wed, 12/06/2006 - 2:04pm.

Exactly.

AP won't say! They refuse to supply anything verifiable. IMHO, because they simply can not.

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AP Keeps Using Dubious Sources

I get the feeling

"AP claims"

Did they really claim that?

They say they sent "AP

My question is who are the "AP reporters"

Exactly. AP won't say! They

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