Money Ball: Newspaper Carrier Gets $301,000 Meant for Baseball Pitcher

By: E&P Staff In one of the most bizarre stories of this or any other week, the Hartford (Ct.) Courant disclosed today that one of its former newspaper carriers, Mark Guthrie, had received $301,000 in checks intended for another Tribune Co. employee, baseball relief pitcher Mark Guthrie of the Chicago Cubs.

And the Courant's Guthrie still has $26,000 of the money, while facing a Tribune lawsuit. "I need them to open the books to me and show me I don't have any tax liabilities," he told the newspaper. "It's mind-boggling. They never should have made the mistake to begin with."

Guthrie, 43, claims he lost his job at the paper in May because of the money dispute. Tribune would not comment on that. It has offered to drop the lawsuit if he will pay the rest back, according to the Courant.

The last of three payments, totaling $301,102.50, was made to carrier Guthrie's bank account on on Oct. 30, 2003. Five weeks later, a representative for pitcher Guthrie, a 15-year major league vet, asked the Cubs about the missing pay. The Cubs called the ir carrier. Whoops.

The carrier Guthrie had noticed the bump in his bank account but figured someone would contact him about it eventually. When he didn't voluntarily return all the money right away, the Tribune was able to go into the account and take back $275,000 before Guthrie froze the account. Tribune says it offered to let Guthrie keep $1,100 plus interest, to no avail.

Guthrie (the ex-carrier) says he wanted to return the money all along but Tribune would not assure him that he did not face a big tax bill from the IRS. He also wondered if some of his (somewhat smaller) paychecks ended up in pitcher Guthrie's account.
According to Courant reporter Kim Martineau, "He wants his legal bills paid, and is considering a countersuit. He said Tribune had no business going into his bank account."