BBC apologizes for headline calling convicted murderer Phil Spector a ‘talented but flawed producer’
BBC News has apologized for an obituary headline that referred to convicted murderer Phil Spector, the record producer who shot actress Lana Clarkson in 2003, as a “talented but flawed producer.”
The headline did not last long, but BBC News said that it should never have appeared at all.
Spector died Saturday of COVID-19 at age 81, in prison for murdering Clarkson, who was 40 at the time.
As the news broke across the world, BBC News posted a headline on its website: “Talented but flawed producer Phil Spector dies aged 81,” the British news network said in a story about its gaffe.
“The breaking news story on Phil Spector’s death was published with a headline that did not meet our editorial standards,” BBC News said in a statement Monday. “This was changed within minutes, and we also deleted a tweet that had gone out automatically with the original headline. We apologize for this error.”
The network emphasized that its coverage had made it clear not only that Spector had been convicted in Clarkson’s murder but that he also “had a long history of violence and abuse.”
The new headline read, “Pop producer jailed for murder dies at 81.”
It was true that Spector launched numerous enduring bands, acts and individual musicians’ careers. It was also true that he forced a gun into Clarkson’s mouth and pulled the trigger, for which he was convicted in 2009.
Phil Spector, music producer and convicted killer, dead at 81
Clarkson’s mother issued a short statement after Spector’s death.
“Lana Clarkson was a warm, compassionate, kind, loving woman who would be 58 years old now,” her mother, Donna Clarkson, told the Daily News in an emailed statement Sunday. “Her energy, brightness and love of life have sustained her family since her murder 18 years ago in 2003.”
