Reuters kills high-flyer's debut column

“David Cay Johnston is having a rough day at work,” The Atlantic Wire reported. The veteran business reporter, pictured, who won his Pulitzer at The New York Times, filed his first piece as a Reuters columnist about News Corp making money on income taxes. He said News Corp received more in tax refunds over the past four years than it paid in taxes. The company had an effective tax rate of -43 per cent and collected over $10 billion in tax refunds over the past four years, Johnston wrote.

That turned out to be incorrect. “Not just an embarrassing typo or a little bit off, but totally, absolutely wrong,” The Atlantic Wire said. “A full correction is coming soon, and it will detail how, exactly, Johnston misread a News Corp. financial statement but for now there’s this posting on Reuters’ Mediafile blog: ‘Please be advised that the David Cay Johnston column published on Tuesday stating that Rupert Murdoch’s U.S.-based News Corp. made money on income taxes is wrong and has been withdrawn.’ Which to any journalist reads as one big ouch.”

“This is particularly painful,” Johnston told The Atlantic Wire. “I have been at this for 45 years. I have never, until now, had to do anything like this. I am assiduous about correcting the record.”

Jim Impoco, executive editor for Thomson Reuters Digital, tweeted: "Can’t withdraw my tweets but will post DCJ’s mea culpa soon: David Cay Johnston column on News Corp taxes withdrawn.”

In a replacement column, Johnston wrote: “Readers, I apologize. The premise of my debut column for Reuters, on News Corp's taxes, was wrong, 100 percent dead wrong.” He made no excuses for what he called “a bonehead error”.

“Tax is my beat, and I was simply looking for what the record showed since Mr. Murdoch is much in the news these days. Some of his British journalists hacked into voicemails, paid off cops and interfered in a murder investigation. Having a long career writing not just about tax, but also about journalistic misconduct, I wondered if there was anything of interest in News Corp's annual disclosure reports...

“I often write tart notes at the Romenesko blog for journalists, the Columbia Journalism Review, Nieman Reports and elsewhere about what I consider flawed reporting by others. I lecture to young reporters around the world on the duty of care they need to take with facts and teach how to check and cross check. Until now I have never made a big mistake, but this is a painful reminder that we all put our pants on one leg at a time. The measure of character, I say in my posts and lectures, is whether when an error is found you forthrightly and promptly correct.

“So I hope readers will trust that while I made a whopper of a mistake, it has been corrected forthrightly and promptly.” ■