Reports of Freedom Paper's Death May Have Been Premature

​Perhaps a daily newspaper the Orange County Register's corporate parent planned to kill will rise from the ashes.

The Arizona daily does circulate just outside Phoenix, after all.

To back up, as we told you in "OC Register Overlord Freedom Communications Kills a Paper," officials from the Irvine-based media company informed East Valley Tribune employees earlier this month that the newspapers serving Mesa, Gilbert, Chandler and Queen Creek will "cease operations" on Dec. 31.

Remaining Trib staffers have cobbled together a follow-up that reveals Freedom received a letter of intent to purchase the Pulitzer-Prize winning 'Zoner newspaper and Web site. Freedom, which is operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is now seeking approval from the bankruptcy judge to complete the sale by the end of this year, Trib publisher Julie Moreno is quoted as saying in her own fish wrap.

The buyer, who is not identified in the piece, plans to keep a "substantial" number of Tribune employees, Moreno says.

If the sale goes through, and things get darker above Grand Avenue in Santa Ana, OC staffers can now pray that lightning from a willing buyer strikes twice.