'Censorship Of Our Publication': Police Investigating Stolen College Newspapers
FORT COLLINS, Colo. (CBS4) - Shelby Holsinger knew something was wrong when she couldn't find an edition of The Collegian newspaper on the Colorado State University campus Tuesday morning.
"We take it as a first amendment violation and a censorship of our publication which is very serious to us," said Holsinger, the Managing Editor of the Collegian. "We were all texting each other saying why can't we find anything and then people were coming up to us saying they saw this campaign taking papers out of the racks."
The collegian prints 1,500 papers each day, but hundreds were being taken, torn apart or recycled. Staffers at the paper started hearing reports that a campaign for student body president and vice president were allegedly behind the theft.
"People were taking handful of copies from our bag boys," Holsinger said. "Essentially we're losing money because all of these copies were stolen."
The paper reported there are discrepancies in financial documents, specifically about how much money was donated by the candidate for student body president and vice president to the Larimer County Food Bank. The polls in the campus election close on Wednesday.
"He made it clear he did not want this stuff published, but it's our due diligence to tell the people the truth. We wanted to make sure people were informed about the candidates and their campaigns before voting," Holsinger said.
The staff of the paper filed a report with campus police who are also looking at surveillance video.
"I feel that everybody who worked on this paper until past midnight last night was cheated out of their opportunity to show what they produced. And all of the reporters that worked on this paper really hard... Their story isn't in the hands of students," said Holsinger.