but using a real news story guaranteed that it'd be free of the distortions that come with writing fiction.

o_0 If only. Journalism is telling stories about the world.[1] The primary sources of history are stories, put together by humans. And just because the humans in question were contemporaneous doesn't mean the stories are in any way free of most of the distortions of fiction.

[1] It's also many other things, but it's certainly that one.