Van Morrison says impending fatherhood story a hoax

Van Morrison’s website hacked. World’s press yet again fail to check the story

“Van Morrison to be a father again at 64″ trumpeted the headlines earlier this week, surprising many. The most surprised of all was Van Morrison himself. The story resulted from an announcement on his website:

“Gigi (Lee) and Van Morrison are proud to announce the birth of their first born son, George Ivan Morrison III. Little Van, born Dec 28, 2009 — the spitting image of his daddy. He is a dual citizen of Northern Ireland/United Kingdom and the United States.”

However, Van Morrison told Irish radio station RTE today that the website had been hacked and that the announcement was a hoax. The idea that he had fathered a child with his manager was “utterly without foundation” and that he was still very happily married to his wife.

Yet again, we’re left wondering whether the world’s press, with such huge resources at their disposal, ever bother to check a story before running it. It’s not so long since several leading newspapers incorporated a fake quote in their obituaries of film composer Maurice Jarre which had only just been added to his Wikipedia entry, while many Australian outlets were hoaxed with a spurious press release about how gullible people in different Aussie cities were (see link below)

Aussie press hoaxed with gullibility survey

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