Unexploded bombs: second world war ordnance disposal and a notorious plagiarism case

A death, a plagiarism scandal and a quest for revenge: the bizarre tale of Otto Z | Alessio Perrone

After his mother died, Otto became convinced he’d been wronged by the forensic investigators – and that one of them was a fraud. The truth was even stranger.

‘It could knock a whole street down’: the art of defusing a second world war bomb | Samira Shackle

On 14 January this year, army and navy squads faced an unprecedented challenge: one bomb on a Plymouth building site, another floating on a dredger in Exmouth. That afternoon, the clock started ticking.

This week, we ran a story about a very strange plagiarism scandal in Germany. We asked the writer, Alessio Perrone, how this exceedingly twisty story evolved in the reporting.

We’ve been working on this piece, in which there are many twists and turns, for nearly six months. How has it changed in the process?
The story mostly chronicles events from 2020 to 2022 that have been the subject of a court case, and the facts largely remained unchanged while I reported it. But my view of the events changed considerably. The story concerns plagiarism allegations, and I began with a fairly neutral stance: I saw academic cheating as a problem to be rooted out. After reporting this story, I now have many reservations about how these allegations are manufactured and circulated – and those reservations have only deepened in the past few months.

What was it like to meet Otto, the man at the centre of your story?
When I set out to report a story, I tend to form an idea of which interviewees will be easy to speak to and who might refuse. I thought Otto would fall into the latter group. Instead, from the moment I first contacted him, he flooded me with information. He sent me 48 emails in the last few months, along with several WhatsApp messages, and I interviewed him for several hours on at least four occasions (I lost count). He has a lot to say, and he is a stereotypically fastidious German septuagenarian, so speaking with him required careful preparation. But, underneath that, I sensed that a powerful undercurrent of emotions had yet to surface.

It’s a story with many surprises, truly jaw-dropping at times. Was there anything you would have liked to explore further in the piece?
A story of this length can seem exhaustive to readers, but there’s a lot that gets left out to keep it – believe it or not! – tight. I would have liked to delve more deeply into the world of commercial “plagiarism hunters”. Individuals hire these private detectives to build plagiarism allegations against someone, often without disclosing their motives. Some of them are colourful characters, and their methods deserve scrutiny.

I also would have liked to hear more from Prof Matthias Graw. He turned down several interview requests before agreeing to speak with me – and I’m grateful for that. But there is still much I’d love to ask him.

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Cancer cons, phoney accidents and fake deaths: meet the internet hoax buster | February 2016

If you enjoyed our piece about the plagiarism hunter, this piece by Rachel Monroe about self-appointed hoax busters is another great read. We go back to the wild west internet days, when people were creating fake cancer and fatal accident dramas on Facebook, some for money, others just for attention. It all feels rather innocent now. The story takes a surprising turn when the vigilantes have a change of heart.

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