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Now, HERE'S an interesting story. It's a shame that we have no idea whether it is true. But it does demonstrate the twists and turns a story can take.

Thursday afternoon I get a call from a reporter with "Entertainment Tonight." He says something like this: "I'm trying to get information about a Greensboro resident who is in jail now and wonder if you can help."

Sure, I say. What's up? He gives me the person's name, what she's in for -- sale of cocaine -- and the date she was sent to prison. He's looking specifically for a photograph of her. I ask him why he's interested. He says: "She's Martha Stewart's cell mate."

I climb back into my chair and ask when he's going to air it. He says Thursday night but that he needs visuals. I tell him we'll check it out from here.

This is what staff writer Eric Collins found: There is a woman from Greensboro by the name the ET reporter gave us in the same prison in West Virginia as Stewart. But that's as far as the trail leads. The prison isn't releasing information, and we can't confirm that she even knows Stewart, much less shares a room with her.

Meanwhile, unknown to me or Collins, staff writer Tom Steadman had heard that former state Agriculture Secretary Meg Scott Phipps is really the one rooming with Stewart. Phipps is in the same prison, serving four years for extortion and mail fraud. Again, there's no real evidence she's rooming with Stewart, and her attorney denies it.

We didn't write any story about this, of course, because you can't write stories based on rumors. ET went ahead with a report without citing a source. I guess they have better sources on the celebrity crime beat.