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Satire site found guilty of fabricating war report
21 Jul 2003
A respected DeadBrain journalist today resigned after it was revealed that a report he made for the web site had been fabricated. James Forlong, who had written hundreds of articles for the web site, made a report on the Iraq war in March that a BBC documentary last night uncovered as a fake.
Mr Forlong claimed to be aboard a British submarine in the Gulf and described in detail the supposed firing of a missile. However, it turns out that the submarine was in fact a rowing boat on a boating lake in Sussex and the crew was made up of a local sea cadet group. The missile that was fired was actually a small catapult supplied by one of the children; and the "big red button" was in fact made out of a yoghurt pot.
"It is with great sadness that we learn that the report was a fake," said DeadBrain's Editor-in-Chief, Gregory T Mullet. "At the time we were totally convinced – James even supplied us with photographs and eyewitness testimonies – but I suppose when we look back there were some clues. In one of the photographs you can see an ice cream van, for example, and one of the accounts describes the ducks that they encountered. So far as we know there are no ducks or ice cream vans hundreds of feet beneath the Gulf, but obviously we can't prove that."
Much of Mr Forlong's report was made up of archive material, including quotes from several pieces of Victorian literature. A DeadBrain source told us that editors had thought this part of his report suspicious, but had presumed he was just trying to be clever.
However, Mr Forlong's line manager, Douglas Ramsbottom, seemed sorry to see him go. "I've just been looking at James's personnel file and he's been on the payroll for nearly twenty years. He's always been an honest and reliable employee," he said. "Hold on, we're only been going for two years and he's had fifteen Christmas bonuses!"
In related news, a Fox News correspondent was today fired after researchers found one of his war reports to be "completely accurate and unbiased". A spokesman for the Murdoch-owned company apologised for the mistake and promised that steps would be taken to prevent it from happening again.
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