UPDATED Dec. 26, 2022, 1:24 p.m. Eastern time: SEE BELOW.

The Arizona Daily Star has an obituary-like retrospective of the career of retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor up right now (Dec. 26, 2022, about 1:50 a.m. Eastern time).

The death of O’Connor would be big news, especially in Arizona, because the former justice is from there.

But no other media outlets are reporting her demise.

To be fair, the Arizona Daily Star article does not say O’Connor, 92, has passed away, but it does seem to treat her death as a fact.

The article begins: “Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, a Republican, was considered a moderate conservative, who was often the ‘swing’ or deciding vote. Here are some of her noted votes and opinions: …”

The wording of the headline indicates the article was pre-written, ready to go for whenever the event happens: “Sandra Day O’Connor: Key rulings on the U.S. Supreme Court-DO NOT PUBLISH, PRE-WRITTEN[.]”

Below is a screen grab (well, a photo actually since I can’t figure out how to do screen grabs on this computer) of the top of the article.

I suppose we’ll find out soon enough what really happened.

Here is the full text of the grab in case you’re having trouble reading it:

Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, a Republican, was considered a moderate conservative, who was often the “swing” or deciding vote. Here are some of her noted votes and opinions:

EQUAL AND CIVIL RIGHTS

1982: O’Connor wrote the majority opinion in Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan, which ruled the nursing school had to admit men to the traditionally women’s-only program. She wrote that excluding males from admission tends to perpetuate the stereotyped view of nursing as an exclusively women’s job, according to the New York Times archive.

1996: Wrote the majority opinion in Shaw v. Reno, which decided that redistricting based on race must be held to a standard of strict scrutiny under the equal protection clause, and must ensure compliance with the Voting Rights Act of 1965. O’Connor said the district in question “bears an uncomfortable resemblance to political apartheid,” the New York Times reported.

UPDATE: The Arizona Daily Star tells me the page was published online in error.

“That’s part of a pre-obit package that should not have been printed,” somebody at the newspaper named Hipolito Corella told me by email.

“Still don’t know how our CMS picked up a sidebar that was not set to publish,” he said. CMS means content management system.

Sandra Day O’Connor is apparently alive and well.