The Associated Press originally sought the records for U.S. military personnel stationed in Japan after attacks against Japanese women raised political tensions there. They might now give weight to members of Congress who want to strip senior officers of their authority to decide whether serious crimes, including sexual assault cases, go to trial. The AP…
Read MoreAlthough President Obama maintains that federal officials are focusing deportation efforts on violent criminals, a Baltimore Sun analysis revealed that a high percentage of the cases in Maryland and some other states involve immigrants with no criminal record. In Maryland, for example, more than 40 percent of the immigrants deported under a sweeping federal program…
Read MoreAfter six workers were killed in a massive gas explosion at the Kleen Energy plant in Middletown four years ago, federal investigators tallied hundreds of violations at the site and issued $16.6 million in penalties against more than a dozen companies — the third-largest workplace-safety fine in the nation’s history. But in the years since…
Read MoreTwo Connecticut tribal casinos have placed dozens of liens on homes across the state since the early 2000s, for amounts as small as a few thousand dollars, according to a Globe review of land and court records. Experts interviewed by the Globe — including current and former casino executives, academics, problem gambling counselors, and a…
Read MoreThe historic drought is making average residents think twice every time they turn on the tap, despite the weekend rain. But there is nothing average about the way Californians consume water: A little-known state database that measures water use in every community shows huge — sometimes shocking — differences between California’s water sippers and guzzlers.
Read MoreSpills releasing PCE, the cancer-causing chemical used in dry cleaning and metal degreasing, have produced at least 86 underground plumes across Colorado that are poisoning soil and water and fouling air inside buildings. Cleaning up this chemical is a nightmare — a lesson in the limits of repairing environmental harm. The best that Colorado health…
Read MoreHeroin, long a scourge of inner cities, has infiltrated suburbia and rural towns and is claiming the lives of an increasingly younger, middle-class and white male clientele at an alarming rate. But new statistics compiled for the Democrat and Chronicle by the office, which investigates suspected drug-related deaths across the region, show that more often than not…
Read MoreLightning Talks are back for CAR 2014 in Baltimore! Got an idea for a talk? Submit it here: http://ire.aronpilhofer.com/ Lightning Talks are 5-minute presentations on topics wide and varied. If you’d like to submit a talk, please use the form linked above. We ask that only folks who are attending NICAR vote on the submissions, and we’ll hear…
Read MoreIf a judge agrees with a court fact-finder, Gannett New Jersey could be getting $542,000 in legal fees stemming from a public records lawsuit. Gannett filed suit in 2009 after several newspapers asked for municipal payroll records in an electronic format, not PDFs. In August 2012 the company won the “precedent-setting case.” As for the…
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