BROOKE BALDWIN (HOST): It was last summer when Seth Rich was shot and killed in Washington, D.C. Investigators say it appeared to be a botched robbery, but conservative blogs began reporting he was killed over alleged links to WikiLeaks. The family debunked the idea but the rumors just won't go away. Oliver Darcy is with me, CNN's senior media reporter, who has been covering this really since it swirled back around in the last week or so. Good to see you and welcome to the CNN family. Explain first of all just how all of these conspiracy theories have been debunked.
OLIVER DARCY: Sure. Last week, essentially, this private detective went on a local Fox affiliate and made some claims that he had evidence saying that Seth Rich, the DNC staffer, had been in contact with WikiLeaks before his death and had leaked documents to them. It's very confusing, but the short story is we contacted him and he admitted that he had no such evidence. So the local Fox affiliate ended up putting an editor's note in their story saying that he's retracted his statements, essentially. The problem is, by the time that happened, it's run wild in conservative media everywhere -- this was on the Drudge Report, this was on Sean Hannity's radio show, Rush Limbaugh, and it's taken on a life of its own.
BALDWIN: Why is Speaker Gingrich and the likes of his still peddling this?
DARCY: It's not clear, and to be clear, there is no evidence suggesting that this DNC staffer had been in contact with WikiLeaks. We've searched; there's zero evidence of this.
BALDWIN: Zero evidence.
DARCY: What Newt Gingrich is saying is just flat-out not true. And I'm not sure where he heard that, maybe he has consumed some conservative media himself and been misled. We contacted him; he didn't respond to our comment request this morning. But it's very, very, very bizarre.
BALDWIN: What about this man's family? What are they saying?
DARCY: The spokesperson for the family has been very forceful in saying he's demanded a retraction and apology from Fox News national, which actually picked up the local story and has not retracted it. Fox News is not responding to requests for comment, I must have asked like half a dozen times last week and --
BALDWIN: Nothing?
DARCY: Nothing. They are just not responding to us. And the story is still up on their website, on the national Fox News website, as they initially reported.
BALDWIN: Stunning.
