Romanesko passes along a story regarding a Chicago ABC affiliate who not only could not get a news story correct, but then in its rush to get a hot story on the air, informed a mother her son was dead after asking for an interview. The problem, besides the soulless, heartless TV news crew? They had the wrong family:

After she had arrived, the crew returned to her front door.

According to [Doris] Glenn, one staffer asked her for an interview, but she was reluctant.

"I said, 'What is this about?' and (the staffer) said she just wanted to interview me," said Glenn. "I said I wouldn't do an interview unless I first knew what it was about.

"And then she said, 'I'm sorry to inform you that your son is deceased,' " Glenn said.

The crew showed up at Glenn's house earlier in the day without explaining why, and Glenn assumed that her son, who competes in track at high school, must have done exceptionally well that day. After the staffer told Glenn her son had died, Glenn declined the interview and called the school, determining that he was taking state achievement tests. The deceased man was a college student in Florida who had come from Chicago.

In other words, Doris Glenn out-researched the so-called professionals at WLS-TV.

But beyond the incompetence, the sheer heartlessness of asking Doris Glenn for an interview when she obviously hadn't been told of her son's death, if it really had been her son, is unbelievable. When were they planning on letting her know her son had died -- while she was on camera? "This is Lucrezia Borgia from Eyewitless News, and I'm here with Doris Glenn, who has no clue that her son was killed earlier today. Tell me, Doris, how does that news make you feel?"

And people wonder why the news media's reputation hovers around the same approval ratings as personal-injury lawyers and used-car salemen.

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