Lonely Planet writer plagerized, dealt drugs

From CNN.com: Travel writer tells newspaper he plagiarized, dealt drugs

Thomas Kohnstamm, who has written a book on his misadventures, also said he didn’t travel to Colombia to write the guidebook on the country because “they didn’t pay me enough,” The Daily Telegraph reported.

“I wrote the book in San Francisco [California],” he is quoted as saying in the Telegraph. “I got the information from a chick I was dating — an intern in the Colombian Consulate.”

I almost bought this book!  I’ve been interested in traveling to Colombia for a while and the Lonely Planet guide book served us pretty well on the New Zealand trip that I was on.

It also says in the story that Lonely Planet didn’t pay enough so he dealt drugs on the side to get by.