TV reporter's shocking comment about missing boy accidentally broadcast
A TV reporter's disparaging comments about a missing boy have been slammed on social media for their insensitive nature.
Sharifa Jackson's remarks were accidentally broadcast on US news station WXTX Fox 54 on Tuesday before the 7pm news to the dismay of viewers at home.
“I am so over this. I don’t know. I don’t think they are going to find him," she can be heard saying.
The four-year-old boy, Beau, disappeared on March 28 and is believed to have drowned in the Chattahoochee River, near Colombus, Georgia.
He was fishing with his father, Ryan Rabon, when witnesses say he slipped in and his father jumped into the flowing river after him.
His father's body was pulled from the water on Sunday after an intensive search.
Despite Ms Jackson's comments, the boy's mother took to Facebook to reveal her hope that the continued searches by the Columbus Fire & Emergency Medical Services and Georgia Department of Natural Resources won't be in vain, The Ledger Enquirer reported.
“They will find my baby! Some Reporters are so vultures I’m realising (sic),” mother Allison Rabon posted.
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Other Facebook users condemned the reporter's choice of words, prompting the Fox-affiliate to issue a statement apologising for Ms Jackson's remarks.
“We apologise that those comments were broadcast live,” the statement read.
“They do not reflect the views of that reporter or our news team when it comes to our approach covering this tragic story.”
