Former Times reporter Kurt Eichenwald has written a long, vehement, must-read letter, providing his own time-line of his meeting and interactions with Justin Berry, the subject of his online kiddie-porn story of December, 2005. He also describes his fight with the Times over disclosing his interactions with Berry, and says that he's begun legal proceedings against Debbie Nathan, a reporter who he describes as "a woman who has a vendetta against me." He describes her account of Justin Berry's recent courthouse appearance as "misleading and false." He is also totally, totally pissed off.

• CBS News hired Rick Kaplan without consulting Katie Couric. They probably just didn't want her to worry her pretty little head about it. [NYT]
  

So it doesn't look like Kurt Eichenwald's check-giving ways are going to disappear from the news anytime soon. [Portions of this post referring to reporting by Debbie Nathan have been redacted for our convenience, as Kurt Eichenwald states that she'll be the subject of a defamation suit.] In response to our initial post about the affair, commenter "stephenmaturin" left a timeline of events that transpired during the reporting of the story; it deserves to be seen by a wider audience. You'll find it after the jump. [Fact-checking in caps!]

• Real estate magnate Sam Zell will probably buy Tribune, which would be nice because it'll finally put an end to this fucking story. [LAT]
  

Tough morning for former New York Times, current Portfolio, reporter Kurt Eichenwald. This morning brings an extraordinary yet difficult-to-parse Times editors' note about his famous kiddie cam-whore story from December, 2005. We already knew that Eichenwald took a while to identify himself as a reporter, so as not to spook the wee one. But now the Times says that after the reporter finally met tiny-hustler Justin Berry in person, he cut him a check for $2000. (That's like, 20 times the rate Justin charged to pose for pictures in his underwear!) What's odd is that it's never made clear why Eichenwald sent the cash, which was later repaid by a family member. For starters, wasn't the whole point of the story that the kid was raking it in?

Congratulations to Kurt Eichenwald, who moves from covering child porn at the Times to covering luxury porn for Cond Nast's forthcoming Portfolio. Eichenwald marks about the thousandth hire for a publication whose long-gestating debut may coincide with Jesus' return, but we're happy to see that Si's sparing no expense to go after top talent. Best wishes, Kurt; Cond 's going to make you need a whole different kind of counseling.

KURT EICHENWALD NAMED SENIOR WRITER, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER OF COND NAST PORTFOLIO [Romenesko]