To apply the same level of journalistic integrity equally to all sources, I think it's fair to say that there are other things that were reported early on, have never been confirmed by LE, yet are accepted as general facts. One example would be this early article:
https://www.wrtv.com/news/local-new...-bodies-found-as-missing-carroll-county-teens
Which says "sources say" a set of footprints led searchers to the victims' bodies. LE has never confirmed this; in fact in the Carroll County Q&A TL refused to confirm, citing an evidentiary aspect of the case. Yet I think most of us would say, yeah - I could believe that this early report from "sources" had an element of truth.
My opinion is that despite some geographic inaccuracies, the Logansport reporter was one of the few MSM boots on the ground at the search and things he heard early on from searchers/sources are important to the case. He was a credentialed member of the MSM just like, say, the reporter Alexis McAdams who has also reported on some things that LE has never confirmed, like boots being taken as evidence from Packers and that Libby shot the video by holding the phone a certain way. I think we don't question these "facts" she's reported on as much, probably because they don't really speak to a motive in the case. But if what the Logansport reporter said was true, then we know the motive and it's even more horrific than we thought.
It's also my opinion that if LE are not going to release a cause of death in this case, or confirm whether there were footprints at the scene, they are certainly not going to confirm that clothing was found in the creek as this, if anything, points to an evidentiary aspect of the case.