Plagiarism at the Tri-State Defender was much more extensive than previously reported, according to the Memphis Flyer, and it may have been perpetrated by the African-American newspaper's current owner, Tom Picou. Last week, Picou told the Flyer that the fraud was committed by an unpaid freelance writer whom he never met in person. This week his former managing editor says she "would stake [her] life on it" that Picou himself was the plagiarist. Most of the stories were lifted straight from the pages of alternative newspapers owned by New Times and Village Voice Media.

Debut literary journal The Believer brings together the talents of novelist Heidi Julavits, Village Voice Senior Editor Ed Park and author Vendela Vida, with the backing of Dave Eggers and McSweeney's, Newsweek reports. The Believer, which has no advertising, isn't paying its editors yet, although they all want to be "critically engaged," Julavits tells Newsweek.

Last week East Bay Express exposed that the Memphis weekly, which calls itself "The Mid-South's Best Alternative Newspaper," had run a plagiarized story about a police scandal, changing Oakland to Nashville but virtually nothing else. Now Memphis Flyer reveals that the paper has been running stories stolen from New Times and Village Voice Media papers for years under the byline Larry Reeves. The mysterious Reeves can't be found, apparently has been writing for free, may be 80 years old, and no one has ever met him. Reeves' pattern is to cut-and-paste stories from AAN member papers, "localized" with a little search and replace on city names. "You can't get that mad because the whole operation is like amateur night," Cleveland Scene Editor Pete Kotz tells the Flyer. "It's so bad it's amusing."