Despite the President’s promise to reform U.S. immigration policy, Hispanics now make up over half of all federal prison population. According to the U.S. Sentencing Commission “Hispanics comprised 50.3 percent of all people sentenced in that time period, blacks 19.7 percent and whites 26.4 percent. In comparison, last year Hispanics made up just 16 percent…
Read MoreBy Jane Regan When a massive earthquake killed some 200,000 people and devastated Haiti, billions of aid dollars poured in from around the globe. Groups such as “God’s Pit Crew” and “Drops of Hope” descended on the island, ostensibly to help people rebuild their lives. Although many of us in Haiti had lost friends, family,…
Read MoreSpencer Ackerman, of WIRED.com Danger Room, has acquired dozens of FBI training materials on counter terrorism and Islam. The training material argues that it does not matter whether or not American Muslims are law abiding citizens, “the Islamic “insurgency” is all-encompassing and insidious. In addition to outright combat, its “techniques” include “immigration” and “law suits.” So…
Read MoreAs part of an effort by three journalism organizations to maintain public access to an important database of physician discipline records, that data is now being made available free of charge through the IRE website. Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Association of Health Care Journalists and theSociety of Professional Journalists have protested the government’s decision to cut off access to The…
Read MoreExposure to lead – even a little – in tap water can cause serious health problems in both children and adults. In this report by Ellen Gabler of the Chicago Tribune, she reveals that a recent federal testing of Chicago’s tap water showed that “nearly 45 percent” of homes “had lead levels spike when more water samples…
Read MoreAt a time when most college sports corruption cases are about athletes, Taylor Branch reveals that the big money is being harvested by the universities. “In 2010, despite the faltering economy, a single college athletic league, the football-crazed Southeastern Conference (SEC), became the first to crack the billion-dollar barrier in athletic receipts. The Big Ten pursued…
Read MoreTeachers not making the grade. Under reported cases of sexual assault and other crimes on college campuses nationwide. Immigrant’s impact on the economy. Journalists from all over the country dug deep to uncover these stories last year with work that won the Philip Meyer Journalism Award. The award recognizes stories that incorporate survey research, probabilities…
Read MoreAfter the attacks on September 11, 2001 President George Bush told the nation that he would make certain that the food we eat would be safe from chemical terrorist threats from the ‘farm to the fork’. However, with no single agency in charge of policing our farms, factories, warehouses, or grocery stores, this multi-headed bureaucracy…
Read MoreMark your calendars: Charles Lewis, executive editor of the Investigative Reporting Workshop at the American University School of Communication, will chat live at the Reynolds Center’s BusinessJournalism.org at 9:30 a.m. (PDT) on Sept. 27. This hour-long conversation will cover investigative journalism and how to turn reporting into a book project. Lewis was the founder of the Center for Public…
Read MoreTwo decades ago, if a doctor ran into malpractice trouble in one state, all he or she had to do was move to another state and their slate was wiped clean. This posed problems for hospitals so, in 1986, Congress “established the National Practitioner Data Bank: a clearinghouse for hospitals, professional societies and state regulators…
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