Talk about burying the lead.
After spending the majority of his column chastising a television station and newspaper for lifting material from his paper, San Antonio Express-News public editor Bob Richter finally gets around to the real news: his paper recently fired a sports reporter for committing plagiarism.
…veteran E-N sports staffer Harry Page was terminated last week for lifting information — which he presented in his bowling blog as his own — from two websites: www.bowl.com, the Web site of the U.S. Bowling Congress, and www.pbatour.com, the Professional Bowlers Association Tour Web site.
The plagiarized work appeared only on MySA.com and has been removed.
Page had worked in the sports department since April 19, 1970, and was one of the first people to greet me here when I joined the sports staff in 1978. I hate to see him go out like this, but, as Editor Robert Rivard told staff, the newspaper has “zero tolerance” for plagiarism.
It was an ethics wakeup call for Express-News journalists and, I hope, will be for our brethren in broadcast news as well.
This important information should have been the main focus of his column, and it would have been good to understand how the plagiarism was discovered, and whether or not Page’s previous work was examined. The paper removed the offending articles, but could more be lurking in the archives? Let’s hope not, but it would be nice to know for sure.
Kudos to Romenesko for spotting it.
