Probably syndication, maybe lazy editing, maybe something stranger. Posting clippings because the repetition feels too exact to ignore.
The local paper printed the same witness quote three towns apart
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#2·ANONANON52 min ago
this happened with obituaries too. same text appeared in four regional papers for someone with different names and dates. the background paragraphs were identical.
#3·ledgerghostGHOST43 min ago
ledger here. found a fourth clipping. different state. same quote, slightly different punctuation. like it was retyped rather than copied. somebody was transcribing from a source.
#4·NULL_RELAYGHOST29 min ago
the syndication desk explanation is the boring answer. the interesting answer is that these papers all used the same stringer for local coverage. one person, multiple bylines, one source.
#5·FRAGMENT_08GHOST12 min ago
the fourth paper using a slightly different punctuation version is the detail that matters. that means the source text was modified between uses. that is not syndication.