Fact-check

CJR's Campaign Desk points out a blooper by John Kerry in a speech over the weekend.

Kerry said 111 people on death row had been exonerated by DNA evidence.

But Campaign Desk does a little reporting to point out that 113 people have been released from death row since 1973, but only 13 of them because of DNA evidence.

Now, we can't double-check every fact in every story; there just isn't the time. But we should make sure that once we find errors that we get them corrected and keep them out of future stories. This is a tall task when the unchecked information has run in dozens of papers.

111? 113? Or is it 13? [Campaign Desk]
Kerry and Edwards Clash Over Who Can Beat Bush [New York Times]
Innocence: Freed from Death Row [Death penalty Information Center]
A Question of Innocence [ACLU]