The Times repeatedly corrects false report of infant’s death in Alice Springs burglary case

The Times has issued multiple corrections after wrongly reporting that a newborn baby had died following an attack by a burglar in Alice Springs, Australia — an error it repeated across consecutive days before amending the story.

In the article “Hope springs… mayor’s struggle to transform a town like Alice” published on 3 November, the paper stated that a newborn child had been killed in the incident. In fact, while the baby was seriously injured, it survived.

The Times first corrected the mistake on 4 November, acknowledging the child had not died and offering an apology. Yet, in a further correction published a day later — 5 November — the paper again reiterated the same clarification, this time noting that the baby “was seriously injured but survived.”

Such repetition is highly unusual and suggests that the initial error continued to appear in different versions or editions of the story, both in print and online. For a national newspaper, repeating the same grave mistake across multiple corrections raises questions about editorial oversight and the internal process for amending sensitive reporting.

Misstating a death — particularly that of a child — is among the most serious factual errors a publication can make. It risks compounding distress for those involved and eroding public trust in the accuracy of foreign correspondence. The fact that this incident required two separate corrections over successive days indicates that the misinformation may have circulated more widely than first realised.

The Times’ apology, which appears twice in two days, emphasised the gravity of the error and confirmed that the infant had survived despite serious injuries. The paper also reminded readers of its commitment to the Independent Press Standards Organisation’s Editors’ Code of Practice, under which accuracy remains the foremost obligation.

Even so, the episode underscores how rapidly unverified details can harden into headlines — and how difficult it can be to correct a falsehood once it has entered public consciousness. In sensitive international crime reporting, a misplaced word can turn a tragedy into a fatality, and then linger long after correction.