"There have been many incidents of torture by police," said Richard Zassissieh, the Zimbabwe country specialist for Amnesty International. "Zimbabwe is a place where the press are struggling to maintain their freedom and [there is] state-sanctioned harassment of journalists."

Chavunduka allegedly became a target of that harassment after his reporter Choto found out about the coup attempt through sources he kept anonymous.

"We could have published the article a week earlier [than we did] but we delayed the article a week to give [the office of the minister of defense] a chance to respond," Chavunduka said.

He said Choto put in calls three to four times a day.

"The minister of defense was supposedly on vacation," Chavunduka said.

The minister of state security was to call the paper back, according to Chavunduka. Finally, after receiving no response from the army or the minister's office, the paper went to press and the article was published on Jan. 10.

"I was alive to the sensitivity of the issue," Chavunduka said. "But I was satisfied...[we had] reliable sources."

The article was damaging to the military because it showed members of the army caught preparing a coup against the government.