ARKANSAS — Echoes could beheard — but not read — throughout the University of CentralArkansas’s empty news racks Sept. 17 when 1,300 copies of The Echo,the student newspaper, were stolen. David Keith, Echo adviser, said another faculty member told him around midday that some paperswere missing. After noticing other bins paperless, Keith sent e-mails to theEcho staff to be alert to the problem. Later that day, thestaff did a survey of campus looking for the missing papers. They found thatprimarily academic buildings in the central part of campus were missingpapers.”Everyone noticed the papers were missing around 10a.m.,” said Aprille Hanson, The Echo’s editor in chief.Hanson was notified at a weekly 3 p.m. editorial meeting about themissing papers. They estimated that 1,300 papers were missing, costing the paper$200.Along with the distribution manager, Hanson went to campuspolice to file a report around 9 p.m.
While the investigation continues, Keith believes the stolen issues mayhave something to do with an editorial that was critical of the StudentGovernment Association’s president.
“That would be theonly controversy in that issue,” he said.According to TheEcho, it costs $700 to $900 to print the paper. They print around 5,500copies weekly.”It shows an extreme lack of maturity,”
said Hanson. “We are going to report the facts. If you have adisagreement, handle it by submitting a letter to the editor, not bytheft.”Keith said the paper would pursue legal actionagainst whoever stole the papers. No suspect has been namedyet.This is not the first time The Echo was stolen. Thenewspaper experienced a mass theft several years ago. The stolen issue carriedan article about an Echo staffer stealing thousands of dollars from thepaper, though no one was ever charged or prosecuted in connection with thetheft.