Rolling Stone magazine retracted Friday its controversial story about an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia after it discovered new information that discredited the piece, a shocking retreat coming merely days after author Sabrina Rubin Erdely defended the reporting.
On Nov. 19, the magazine ran a story of "Jackie," an unidentified UVA. student who says she was gang-raped at a party at the house of Phi Kappa Psi in the fall of 2012. Her shocking story, with vivid details from the night of the incident, and its charges that sexual assaults at UVA. often go unreported embarrassed the university and launched an investigation by school officials and local police. All Greek life activities were also suspended in the wake of the story.
"In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie's account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced," wrote Will Dana, the magazine's managing editor said on its website.
"We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account," the post said. "We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story."