Regret the Error

First they had the exclusive (!) that Chief Justice John Roberts was “considering” stepping down:

John Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, is seriously considering stepping down from the nation’s highest court for personal reasons, RadarOnline.com has learned exclusively.

And then RadarOnline.com had the exclusive (!) that he wasn’t:

Despite considering resigning from the U.S. Supreme Court, Chief Justice John Roberts will stay on the bench, RadarOnline.com has exclusively learned.

Above the Law has been on this from the beginning and believes the rumor originated in a Georgetown Law class:

We stand by our primary claim that this gossip arose out of Professor Peter Tague’s criminal law class at Georgetown Law, in which he tried to teach his students a lesson about the credibility and reliability of informants. But we would like to retract one aspect of our earlier coverage. We wrote:

Note the timestamps on the Radar posts. The first one came out at 6:10 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:10 a.m. Eastern time. The retraction came out at 6:36 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:36 a.m. Eastern — shortly after Professor Tague let his class in on the joke.

We now believe that the time stamps on the Radar post bear little or no relation to reality…

They go on to detail the time stamp issue and admit that some of their work on this false rumor includes an element of speculation. But, as noted above, they stand by their claim. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times and NPR also have stories.

 Report an error