NYT caught cheating

Zachery Kouwe, a reporter for the Dealbook blog, apparently swindled passages from the WSJ and other news organizations. The paper began looking into the theft after the Journal's editor-in-chief, Robert Thomson, sent off a letter to Times Executive Editor Bill Keller that cited the plagiarism. From the Times correction:

They pointed out extensive similarities between a Journal article, first published on The Journal's Web site around 12:30 p.m. on Feb. 5, and a DealBook post published two hours later, as well as a related article published in The Times on Feb. 6. Those articles described an agreement on an asset freeze for members of Bernard L. Madoff's family, in a lawsuit filed by a court-appointed trustee. In the Times article and the DealBook post, several passages are repeated almost exactly from the Journal article.

Kouwe used to work for the NY Post, which, like the Journal, is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News. Corp.