The Hartford Courant's publisher apologized Friday for what appears to have been the wholesale plagiarizing by his newspaper of local stories from other Connecticut papers.

Here's the message from Richard J. Graziano in its entirety:

The Hartford Courant is America's oldest continuously published newspaper. We've been in business for 245 years. We've earned a reputation for integrity and we take it very seriously. Throughout our history we have served the community by highlighting wrongdoing and violations of ethics when we find them. It is only right that we focus the same light on ourselves when we are wrong.

So, it's incumbent upon me as publisher to tell you that we failed to meet our own standards and, as we would with anyone else, we are flagging it, calling it wrong and taking action.

In short, after an extensive internal review, we have determined that over the last several weeks The Courant plagiarized the work of some of our competitors. This was not our intent, but it is in fact what happened. We are taking corrective action to prevent it from happening again. We have also disciplined the individuals involved.

 

There is nothing more sacred to a newspaper than its credibility. It is my responsibility to point out our ethical violations and tell you that this newspaper's staff and I are deeply sorry. We apologize to our readers, competitors and advertisers.

The Courant wants to assure its readers and news staff that we vigorously subscribe to strict journalistic ethics and to maintaining and achieving lasting credibility. We know that there is nothing more important to a newspaper.

Richard J. Graziano
CEO, President & Publisher, Hartford Courant
Senior Vice President Tribune Broadcasting
General Manager WTIC/WTXX

It appears the instances of plagiarism were numerous and widely noticed by the Courant's competitors.

The New Britain Herald posted a story on Aug. 29, 2009. Here's an excerpt:

In most cases The Courant has been attributing the reporting to the newspapers being copied, which include the Journal Inquirer, The Bristol Press, The Herald of New Britain, the Register-Citizen of Torrington, and the Waterbury Republican-American.

In some cases The Courant appears to have lifted information from the other papers in its entirety without any attribution. But either way, editors say, the Courant is using for free and making money from a product other papers pay to produce, and they want it to stop.

Bristol Press and New Britain Herald Publisher Michael E. Schroeder says he has not yet fully analyzed how much The Courant has copied the work of his newspapers, but "we know that it's happening."

Reporting from the Bristol and New Britain papers has been lifted with "minimal or no attribution" by the Courant, Schroeder says. He's still deciding how to handle the situation, but says, "we do expect to enforce our rights to the letter of the law. The newspaper that produces copy pays to get it produced. We serve our market very intensely. Any wholesale lifting of the product of our work is at best plagiarism, at worst outright theft."

Waterbury Republican-American Executive Editor Jonathan Kellogg says it is clear to him that "many of their bylined stories are including information from the Republican-American. . . There certainly is an extraordinary amount" of Republican-American reporting on the Courant's Internet site.

As in academia, few offenses are greater in journalism than plagiarism. Every journalist knows, or should know, that using someone else's work product without attribution isn't tolerated at professional news organizations.

Given that, it's hard to understand how those responsible for the Courant plagiarism thought they'd get away with it.