"Psychic" Offers Police Tip About 20-30 Bodies Buried Under a Plot of Texas Land; Media Starts Minute-By-Minute Coverage of "Texas Murder Lawn;" Media Later Confirms That Psychics Aren't Real

I saw this story being linked on Twitter, as at least four media outlets -- CBS, ABC, CNN, and Fox -- began with the live video feed of CSIs and cadaver dogs at the "Texas Murder Lawn" as DrewM. called it (I called it "LAWN OF HORRORS").

I began joking about it when I realized the media had not actually confirmed 20-30 mutilated bodies, including those of children, before breathlessly reporting such.

I came in just as the media began doing a few walk-backs about just how many bodies might be buried under the Texas Murder Lawn.

I put my chips on "hoax" and began making fun of them, although, actually, I jumped the gun, too. I mean, if this turned out real... well, a lot of these tweets would have looked rather ugly and callous.

But it was a hoax. My psychic powers divined that this other psychic was a fraud, unlike me.

Someone said "Maybe they had inside information that this was legit." Well, I think it's more likely that they had hopes they were about to get some awesome footage of body excavations.

Hat tip to @allahpundit, who put me in the mind of joking when he asked, "Wait, the media didn't bother confirming there were 30 children's bodies buried here before reporting that?"

Top Twelve Breathless Media Headlines Reporting "Fact" of 20-30 Bodies Buried In Texas Murder Lawn... Or, Maybe, None At All

12. CBSNews BREAKING: "Lawn of Horrors" Said To Contain Either 20 Multilated Children's Corpses, or Dirt

11. CNN BREAKING: FURIOUS RACE AGAINST TIME TO PRESERVE EVIDENCE OF LOAM

10. FOX NEWS: Six Recovered Bones May Be Human, or KFC

9. New York Post: SLAYGROUND -- TEXAS MURDER LAWN ESTIMATED TO CONTAIN UP TO ZERO HUMAN BODIES

8. CNN: Quiet Suburban Death-Lawn May Hide Evidence of Ritual Murder; Or, Kickball

7. New York Daily News: MURDER PLOT: SUSPICIOUS DAFFODILS MAY HOLD KEY TO SOLVING TEXAS WEED-WACKER MASSACRE

6. CBSNews: "One Child's Body So Badly Mutilated It "Resembles Old Soccer Ball;" Investigators Ponder Riddle of Killer's Codeword-Clue, "FIFA"

5. NBCNews: CADAVER DOGS CONFIRM POSSIBLE MASS GRAVE AND/OR SQUIRRELS

4. Local News Tease: "Tips from experts on how you can avoid being buried in a Texas Murder Lawn. Plus, the seven-week slim-down diet."

3. CNN UPDATE: BODIES IN TEXAS MURDER LAWN HIDDEN "WITH SURGICAL PRECISION"

2. NBCNews: New Theory That Killer Preyed Only on Invisible People; Hunt On For the Man Some Are Calling "The Tinkerbell Killer"

And the number one media headline on the Texas Murder Lawn, coming in after the hoax was confirmed...

1. Tease for this Sunday's Geraldo Rivera Live: GARDEN OF EVIL: BLOOD-SOAKED SEX-LAWN MAY YET YIELD HOT DEATH SEX VICTIMS

Bonus After-Hoax Headline:

0. Howard Kurtz' "Reliable Sources" Roundtable Segment Title: "Don't you think that the media was wise, justified, and prudent in furiously jumping the gun on the Texas Murder Lawn?"

posted by Ace at 02:06 PM

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