Newspapers steal stories from each other all the the time, even staffers. But Village Voice Media just had its vans seized by an alt-weekly competitor in San Francisco. We knew the industry was getting desperate, but, damn.

The seizure was part of the independent San Francisco Bay Guardian's eager efforts to collect on a $16 million predatory pricing judgment against the SF Weekly, owned by Village Voice Media. VVM honchos Jim Larkin and Mike Lacey are appealing the judgement, and in the meantime insist their company is insulated from liability, since SF Weekly is incorporated separately. So if you take this job at the Voice you can't be seized and Shanghaiied to the Guardian offices in San Francisco to work as an office slave. Probably.

(Pic: Minivan being towed amid a slightly more violent dispute in Tijuana, Mexico. Getty Images.)