AP had picked it up from the World Entertainment News Network (see some of their previous work here and here). According to an article in the New York Times, WENN says it had spotted the tale in the Daily Star, a UK tabloid (see some of their previous work here and here). An AP stringer in India saw the WENN piece and wrote it up; then AP put it on the wire before waiting receiving a reply from Hilton’s spokesperson.

The Times contacted Jesse Washington, AP’s entertainment editor, for an explanation. “The irony in the story was obvious,” he said. “But it doesn’t change the fact that you have to verify it. This time we didn’t, and we got burned.”

The story also contains one of the more amusing explanatory paragraphs to have graced the pages of the Times:

For the record, it is apparently true that elephants there get drunk on farmers’ homemade rice beer, then go on rampages. But it is not true that Ms. Hilton, who served jail time this year for violating probation after a drunken driving arrest, told reporters, “The elephants get drunk all the time. It is becoming really dangerous. We need to stop making alcohol available to them.”

While AP did put out a correction to its customers, it didn’t offer a full explanation until the Times came calling. Perhaps it will offer a more of a proactive admission the next time it gets caught pimping Paris Hilton and drunken elephants. Or just hold off and wait for the appropriate verification before piling on.

After all, did this story really require such a rush to publish?

In a Nov. 13 story, The Associated Press incorrectly reported that Paris Hilton was praised by conservationists for highlighting the problem of binge-drinking elephants in northeastern India. Lori Berk, a publicist for Hilton, said she never made any comments about helping drunken elephants in India.

From the original article:

GAUHATI, India (AP) — With Rwanda off her charity calendar, Paris Hilton has turned her attention to the plight of … drunken elephants in India.
“The elephants get drunk all the time. It is becoming really dangerous. We need to stop making alcohol available to them,” the 26-year-old socialite was quoted as saying by the World Entertainment News Network’s Web site.
In the wake of her jail term for an alcohol-related reckless driving case, Hilton is seeking to remake her image from club-hopping party girl to world-traveling do-gooder. She announced plans to do charity work in Rwanda, but the trip was postponed until next year.
Then opportunity for Hilton’s “global elephant campaign” knocked last month when six parched pachyderms broke into a farm in the state of Meghalaya and guzzled farmers’ homemade rice beer. The elephants went on a rampage, then uprooted an electricity pole and were jolted to death…

WENN is not exactly a reliable outlet when it comes to celebrity scoops. We’ve published  two previous posts about salacious WENN stories that were later retracted. See here and here.  AP and other media outlets should not be publishing “scoops” from WENN without doing some independent verification.

We can’t locate the original.