What happens when good or not-so-good reporters do bad things? In most cases, probably nothing. Usually, no one ever finds out. Two recent episodes illuminate a very different scenario.

The first has come to light through an Editor’s Note in the New York Times. It turns out that a Times reporter, Kurt Eichenwald, wrote a $2,000 check to a young man, Justin Berry, who was the main subject of his 2005 article about sexual exploitation on the Internet.

Eichenwald, who is no longer with the Times, had not disclosed this payment to his editors. It emerged into view only in the course of criminal proceedings involving one of Berry’s sexual contacts. “Times policy forbids paying the subjects of articles for information or interviews. A member of Mr. Berry’s family helped repay the $2,000,” says the note.

Okay, case closed, and we can thank the Times for its candid disclosure–unless, that is, there is more here than meets the eye. Like why did that money change hands in the first place? According to the editorial note, “Eichenwald said he was trying to maintain contact out of concern for a young man in danger, and did not consider himself to be acting as a journalist when he sent the check.”

But the same day the Times editorial note appeared, Eichenwald offered a different answer to the Associated Press: he “explained he had sent the teen a check as part of a ploy to learn his true name and address.”

All of this smells fishy. The two conflicting explanations for the payment do not fit together so readily, do not fit with the story that Eichenwald wrote–which omits mention of the payment entirely–and do not fit with common sense. Even if Eichenwald was acting as a concerned citizen, as he says, and not as a journalist, would he really part with $2,000 of his own money with no expectations of getting a story and no strings attached? Count me skeptical.

There are other question marks as well. Justin Berry, Eichenwald had reported, was a cocaine addict; did the infusion of cash do him good or serious harm? And what induced one of his relatives to help pay the $2,000 back–a lot of money, after all? Was it to help the reporters and editors at the New York Times abide by their ethics rules? It doesn’t make sense. There are other odd connections between Eichenwald and Berry as well, as we learn from Jack Shafer’s sleuthing in Slate.

But even if we go along with the Times editorial note and pretend not to notice the various fish scents still hanging in the air, how should we assess reportorial conduct in the second of the two cases I mentioned?

Reporters for the San Francisco Chronicle were fed confidential grand-jury testimony about steroids produced by the BALCO “food supplement” firm being consumed by professional athletes. The source of the illegal grand-jury leak, it has now come to light, was a BALCO lawyer by the name of Troy Ellerman, who then turned around and used the resulting Chronicle story to ask the court for a mistrial, claiming that the leak made it impossible for his client to get a fair trial.

Here’s where the Chronicle reporters stepped over a line. They didn’t give Ellerman cash for the leaked information but offered him payment in kind: silent participation in his fraud on the court. Indeed, even after Ellerman demanded a mistrial based upon his own leak to the press, one of the Chronicle reporters dropped in on him to gather even more secret grand-jury information.

Ellerman has pleaded guilty to four felony counts of obstruction of justice. The Chronicle reporters do not face charges. But how was the public, and the cause of justice, served by their part in this charade?

Who is watching the watchdogs? How do we know how many other journalists are out there proudly holding up the banner of the First Amendment while doing shady things? How, in particular, do we know what kind of inducements highly competitive journalists are giving to sources in order to receive what might be a Pulitzer-prize-winning leak?

The answer is: we don’t.