TMZ's Bamboozling Erin Andrews Coverage

TMZ has curiously been anointed the white-hatted hero for turning over the email address of the individual accused of tearing apart a peephole and filming Erin Andrews undressed multiple times. So why did they screw up the story so badly? According to the affidavit, Michael David Barrett contacted Dennis Broad of TMZ on January 28th and tried to broker a deal for his grainy EA peephole footage. TMZ turned him down because they wanted no parts of it, according to Harvey Levin. I spoke to Levin on July 16th, after the links to the footage started to show up in our inbox to see if he'd heard anything about it. At the time, Levin said he "knew nothing about it" and "wouldn't run it anyway because it's illegal." Fair enough. But once the story broke and it couldn't be ignored any longer, TMZ went full-throttle on Erin Andrews after "reviewing" the tape that had been sent to them in January, apparently. So they have a possible lead on the man&...