Disability Activists Demand Retraction and Correction from Associated Press
AP-Ipsos Poll Question Inaccurate and Misleading

For more information:
Diane Coleman & Stephen Drake,
708-209-1500, exts. 11 & 29
708-420-0539 (cell)

May 30, 2007 -- Disability activists have demanded corrective action from the Associated Press after the release of poll data just three days prior to the parole of Jack Kevorkian. Kevorkian has served 8 years on a second-degree murder conviction for his killing of Thomas Youk by lethal injection.

According to a widely-distributed AP story announcing the results, 53% of the respondents disagreed with Kevorkian's incarceration.

According to disability activists who have followed Kevorkian's career closely, the results are highly suspect since the question they were given misled them in regard to the nature of Kevorkian's crime and the characteristics of his overall ³body count.²

According to the AP, the survey asked the following question:

³Do you think that Michigan doctor Jack Kevorkian should have been jailed for assisting terminally ill people end their own life, or not?²

³This question misinforms the respondent about the nature of the crime Kevorkian was convicted of and also mischaracterizes the health status of the majority of people who died at his hands. As anyone who watched the 60 Minutes telecast knows, Kevorkian directly injected lethal chemicals into Thomas Youk. This is not Œassistance¹,² says Stephen Drake, Not Dead Yet's research analyst. ³Further, the word 'people' is paired with 'terminally ill', indicating that the majority of his body count consisted of people who were close to death. Beginning with the Detroit Free Press series 'The Suicide Machine' in 1997, there is overwhelming documentation that the majority of people who went to Kevorkian had non-lethal chronic conditions and disabilities.

Diane Coleman, president of Not Dead Yet, personally contacted Trevor Thompson, the AP's Manager of News Surveys, to demand a retraction and correction. 

³Mr. Thompson eventually agreed the question didn't jive with the facts of Kevorkian's career or conviction, but rejected any corrective action after consulting with the DC Bureau Chief, Sandy Johnson. Johnson claimed that the story about the poll was accurate, disregarding their responsibility for contaminating their poll with a misleading question.²

Carol Gill, Ph.D., agrees with the concerns of Not Dead Yet. "All good survey designers know that misleading questions produce invalid results. When participants are asked to respond to inaccurate and confusing items, the result is spoiled data. Unfortunately, this poll contained flawed questions. It's impossible to base sound conclusions on these results." Professor Gill is a research psychologist and associate professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Drake adds that the refusal of Thompson and Johnson to address the misinformation in their poll is a violation of the AP's public ³Statement on Values and Principles,² which calls for swift and comprehensive corrective action when they publish erroneous information.

³This is worse than the usual error,² says Drake. ³In this case, they created news in the form of a survey and then reported on it. Instead of simply reporting misinformation, they have created it in a way that superficially resembles scientific sampling. They have knowingly polluted the public discussion about an important public policy topic.  And they are refusing to take responsibility for it.²

Coleman and Drake are available for interviews.

Not Dead Yet
7521 Madison St.
Forest Park, IL 60130 708-209-1500
http://www.notdeadyet.org