What happens next Where's my refund? Best CD rates this month Shop and save 🤑
MONEY
Fox News

Fox News corrects gun incident story

Roger Yu
USA TODAY
FILE - This May 24, 2011 file photo shows Fox News Channel anchor Shepard Smith. He is in charge of a breaking news team. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File) ORG XMIT: NYET400

Fox News issued an on-air correction Monday, retracting a report earlier in the day that a Baltimore police officer shot a black man on the street.

"What's happened is we screwed up," Fox anchor Shepard Smith told viewers Monday afternoon. "Our people on scene were wrong. Theirs was an error that was honest and straightforward and our duty as journalists is not to make mistakes. And when we make mistakes we are duty-bound to correct them immediately and as clearly as possible."

At about 2:45 p.m. Monday, Fox reporter Mike Tobin erroneously claimed on Fox News' The Real Story that he saw police officers chasing a man and one of them "drew his weapon and fired and struck the individual who was running away."

Soon after the report, the Baltimore police department refuted the report via Twitter. "The reports of a man being shot at North and Pennsylvania Ave are NOT true. Officers have arrested a man for a handgun at the location," it said.

According to a Fox News story that was still posted on its website as of late afternoon, the man dropped a gun as he was fleeing.

"Mike Tobin thought he saw somebody get shot," Smith said. "Unless there's new information that comes forward, all the information now points to...a guy running down the street. Gun fell in the street, gun went off, guy was taken into custody."

Featured Weekly Ad