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US Rep. Giffords shot dead in Arizona, gunman held

TUCSON, Ariz., Jan 8 (Reuters) – U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona died after being shot in the head while meeting constituents at a grocery store in Tucson, NPR reported on Saturday.

Giffords, a 40-year-old Democrat in her third term in Congress, was shot point blank by an unidentified gunman who fired indiscriminately into the crowd, NPR and other U.S. media said.

Your reporting without adequate confirmation that Congresswoman Giffords had died when she was, in fact, still alive was irresponsible and represented an appalling lapse in judgment and journalistic professionalism. Being first is never more important than being right.

Please remember that.

L.F.P.

We used the NPR report that Giffords had died in line with our practice of picking up reliable media on breaking news developments.

We cited NPR for the report, which turned out to be wrong.

We were making constant checks with officials and we sent an alert 14 minutes later to report, quoting the hospital spokeswoman, that she was in fact alive. GBU Editor

U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) in an undated handout photo provided by her Congressional campaign, January 8, 2011.

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