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By Stanley Tromp, IRE member and independent journalist
If anyone thinks that investigative reporting is a sunset profession, this idea was obliterated for me after I attended the Investigative Reporters and Editors’ superlative conference in San Francisco in late June. There, some of the toughest and sharpest investigative reporters in the United States shared their skills, which reporters usually keep hidden, with remarkable generosity at more than 100 panels and workshops.
The speakers taught 1,600 delegates from around the world new ways to investigate the courts, organized crime, government surveillance, health care, college sports, immigration, whistleblowers, clean energy, religion, gambling, Hollywood, the oceans, memorabilia fraud, and more. As a Canadian, I noted that while most of the topics were universal, a few such as covering the death penalty and rampant handguns were distinct to America.
IRE, founded in 1975, now has 5,000 members, several hundred of them foreign, and many of these Canadians. It was the model for what became the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ), and has long been a source of inspiration and empowerment abroad, even before I attended the first joint IRE-CAJ workshop — called Crossing the 49th — in Vancouver in 2002. Because there was then nothing like it in Canada, I bought the IRE Handbook in 1991 and have since read hundreds of the group’s 4,000 how-to advice tipsheets — and this year began listening to online audio of the panels — with very useful results.
At the yearly IRE Awards luncheon, executive director Mark Horvit, who had just returned from teaching journalism in Nigeria, noted that 500 story entries had been received that year. It refutes the myth that investigative reporting has been irreversibly fading since the Golden Age of the 1970s.
I cannot sum up in such a short space the variety, power, and insights of the 2014 presentations, some of which left one unsettled and humbled. It’s also sometimes good to see one’s own work in the widest possible context. For instance, Rana Sabbagh, executive director of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism noted how reporters in that region fight to get the truth out despite jailings and killings. All this makes our journalistic obstacles here – such as flawed FOI laws, newsroom cutbacks, arrogant PR flaks who outnumber reporters by four-to-one - seem picayune indeed.
But what impressed me most was a panel on small town newspapers, with heroic reporters risking their lives in the deep south to expose incredibly grotesque corruption.
“You might want to carry a gun, y’all,” began Kathy Cruz of the Hood Country News (Texas), not in jest. Panelist Tim Crews of The Sacramento Valley Mirror, who exposed how a 2007 “suicide” was actually a homicide, said he indeed keeps a shotgun on his porch.
Samantha Swindler recalled her days as editor of the Corbin Times-Tribune in Whitley County, Kentucky, population 35,000, birthplace of Kentucky Fried Chicken. She had hired 20-year-old Adam Sulfridge for his first assignment, which eventually led to them revealing that the local drug-addicted sheriff had been stealing and selling guns and narcotics. (He’s now serving 15 years in federal prison and 15 of his associates also were convicted.) Both journalists faced death threats and carried guns, and federal agents told Sulfridge the sheriff had plotted to kill him.
As my trip came to an end I regretted leaving our southern neighbors who have a far stronger tradition of aggressive reporting and open government. American reporters would never accept many of the constraints that Canadians quietly do, and they push back hard against those working to hide or spin embarrassing truths in their conflict-charged, often-hazardous trade.
While the panelists taught practical skills, perhaps more importantly they conveyed a vantage point from which to see the Canadian scene anew, a robust spirit to hopefully apply here. Both the reporters’ drive to produce investigative reporting and the public’s appetite to read it are inextinguishable, even if readers sometimes forget that it cannot be produced for free. (Perhaps the new funding model lies in foundations.) At times with deep funding cuts it may look like the challenges that such reporters face today are insurmountable, but these heroic speakers prove that indeed where there’s a will there’s a way, and that the key question should be not, “Can we afford to have investigative reporting?” but rather, “Can we afford not to?”
Stanley Tromp is the FOI caucus coordinator for the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ), and has been writing investigative news for many publications for 20 years. He can be reached at stanleytromp@gmail.com.
It’s the best deal you can get in the nation’s capital. For $10, you can learn investigative techniques from some of the best journalists in the country. Yes, $10.
IRE’s Watchdog Workshop will be held in Washington, D.C. on August 13. The workshop will take place at the AAJA annual conference, but it’s open to all journalists and students. Non-AAJA members are welcome to attend and you don’t have register for the full conference.
Check out our full line-up here: https://www.ire.org/events-and-training/event/1513/
Last month, more than 1,600 IRE members gathered in San Francisco for training and to discuss the biggest issues facing our craft. Chief among them was the threat of government actions against investigative journalists and their sources, as underscored by Lowell Bergman's keynote speech, a panel on whistleblowers including Daniel Ellsberg and a showcase panel on surveillance.
Following the conference, we got a lot of inquiries from members about what they could do, specifically about New York Times reporter James Risen, who was the focus of much of Bergman's speech. The federal government is trying to force Risen to reveal a source; Risen could face jail time if the matter is not resolved very soon.
One step we're taking is to keep our members apprised of efforts on Risen's behalf. A petition drive is underway to encourage Attorney General Eric Holder to halt all legal action against Risen. Here is the wording of the petition, which is supported by several organizations including the Freedom of the Press Foundation, Reporters Without Borders, and Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, among others:
To: President Obama and Attorney General Holder
Your effort to compel New York Times reporter James Risen to reveal his sources is an assault on freedom of the press. Without confidentiality, journalism would be reduced to official stories -- a situation antithetical to the First Amendment. We urge you in the strongest terms to halt all legal action against Mr. Risen and to safeguard the freedom of journalists to maintain the confidentiality of their sources.
If you wish to sign the petition, go to http://act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=9775.
IRE's board has asked our Public Advocacy Committee to review steps the organization can take on Risen's behalf. If you are aware of any ongoing efforts, or have suggestions for steps IRE can take, please contact IRE board member Andrew Dohonue at adonohue@cironline.org.
Today starting at 12 p.m. CDT we’ll be talking about how to investigate the death penalty and shed light on secrecy surrounding lethal injection practices. To watch the broadcast and submit questions, click here. You can also tweet us questions at @IRE_NICAR using the hashtag #IREHangout.
We’ll be joined by four journalists who have been covering executions: Ziva Branstetter of the Tulsa World, Chris McDaniel of St. Louis Public Radio, Brian Haas of The Tennessean and Della Hasselle, a contributor to The Lens.
After the broadcast, the recording will be posted to our Hangouts page.
This post was originally published at Newsroom by the Bay
By Elijah Akhtarzad
The Investigative Reporters and Editors conference held at the Marriott Hotel in San Francisco on June 27 included a first-hand account of the YanukovychLeaks discovery from journalists Olesya Ivanova and Denys Bigus. Both reporters were on the scene at Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych’s home immediately following his ouster from power and the discovery of thousands of hidden documents that were thrown into a nearby lake.
Ivanova and Bigus lived in Yanukovych’s home for more than seven days, reviving the wet documents that would reveal the corruption in the government that dominated Ukraine for three years under Yanukovych.
Other journalists accompanied Ivanova and Bigus to salvage what remained of the drenched documents by using blow dryers and even Yanukovych’s own home sauna. The discovery of the confidential documents caused Ukrainian people of all professions and communities to come together and unite in order to provide the journalists at the scene with needed materials such as scanners and food. Citizens volunteering to help the journalists communicated with them via a Facebook page.
“Ukrainians aren’t known for volunteering a lot,” Ivanova told the IRE conference. “It’s just not a habit in our country. But in this situation, people from different professions, of different age and of different knowledge of what even happened came with their own cars, their own equipment and with their own scanners. People just came out of nowhere bringing scanners and blow dryers, and worked every day and night, not sleeping or eating.”
Remarkably, it was the use of social media that helped connect the country to the journalists who were revealing the corruption that haunted their country during Yanukovych’s reign. The Facebook page set up by the journalists served as the main source of communication and aid between the Ukrainian citizens and journalists who remained at the scene for over a week. Without the Facebook page, Ivanova and Bigus said, they would have had very limited access to the outside world and would not have been able to recruit supporters and volunteers who delivered scanners, dryers and food to Yanukovich’s mansion, their work site.
With print journalism on the brink of vanishing and the web media taking over as the main source of news, Ivanova, Bigaus and the eight other journalists living in Yanukovych’s home proved that online media has a greater viewing reach and even a stronger influence globally than that of print.
When a wave of riots called Euromaidan started on November 13 in an effort to exile former president Yanukovych, Twitter exploded with an individual account under the handle @Euromaidan and the #euromaidan hashtag went viral.
“When you say to make Maidan, it means you are rising a big national protest and this has happened twice in our history, this time being the second,” Ivanova said.
“It all started with a famous Ukrainian journalists who posted on his Facebook profile that we need to come together and ‘make Maidan.’ This is how people gathered on the main square, and after that first day, more and more people gathered every day to protest peacefully at the square.”
Not only journalists, but also regular citizens fighting for a common cause were able to report breaking news on Twitter and let it go viral. The Euromaidan Twitter account reached 141,000 followers within days, and protesters used hashtag trends and Twitter accounts as a way to pressure the Yanukovych government and allow the country to view the demonstrations and be updated on what was happening at the Maidan Square in the Ukranian capital of Kiev.
With the use of social media, the Ukrainian citizens themselves were able to provide an outlet for the whole world to see the unrest in their country and Euromaidan protests. Essentially, they acted as journalists themselves without even acknowledging it. They used the network and reach capabilities of Facebook and Twitter to oust president Yanukovych and attempt to rid the country of corruption, showing that the power of online media is definitely challenging that of print.
Elijah Akhtarzad will be a senior this fall at Harvard-Westlake High School in Los Angeles, California.
Newsroom by the Bay is an intensive digital journalism program for high school students, held every summer at Stanford University. Participants include students from across the U.S. and overseas, along with teachers and team leaders drawn from the nation's top high school and college journalism programs. For more information, please head to www.newsroombythebay.com or contact co-directors Beatrice Motamedi and Paul Kandell at newsroombythebay@gmail.com.
By Laura Rena Murray
Sally Lehrman of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics and Venise Wagner of San Francisco State University discussed reporting tools and strategies to better cover institutional inequity. Wagner and Lehrman began the session with personal tales.
Lehrman’s great-grandfather moved to Colorado to be cured of tuberculosis in a sanitarium – prevailing anti-Semitism of his time blamed the disease on weak genetics. Wagner’s grandfather had worked as a repairman mechanic for U.S. Steel and watched white immigrant colleagues he trained ascend the ranks while he stayed trapped in a low-level position. Wagner said his story inspired her to want to understand the mechanics of racism.
Too often, Wagner and Lehrman noted, reporters draw comparisons between one minority group and whites, which prompts readers to think about stereotypes of minority groups. Instead of portraying these groups as having “less than,” they encouraged attendees to show whites have “more than” other less privileged groups.
"More than shining a light on injustice,” Lehrman cautioned, “show where it comes from.”
There is a continuum of responsibility that Lehrman and Wagner invited the audience to work use when reporting. Move from personal responsibility to examining living and working conditions to institutional and structural practices and policies to social hierarchy and privileges.
“Go up the scale of what shapes the inequity,” Lehrman said.
“A lot of stories are missing historical context and structural elements,” Wagner pointed out. “Reporting needs to shift more from the individual to the institutional.”
It is important to examine the policies, practices, economic and social opportunities and resources available when investigating social problems.
“Push past the negative conditions and behaviors to look at the neighborhood design,” Wagner recommended. “Is there racial segregation? A lot of liquor stores? No sidewalks? What policies designed that?”
By doing so, she said, it is possible to put agency in the hands of people who live in those neighborhoods.
“What gives stories power is being able to document the structure,” Lehrman said. “Who’s making the decisions that make racism possible?”
Laura Rena Murray is a San Francisco-based independent investigative journalist covering public interest and accountability stories that highlight corruption, mismanagement or human rights violations.
By Chhaya Nene
Minorities will account for more than a third of U.S. households by 2025, according to a recent study. Molly Hennessy-Fiske, of the Los Angeles Times; Momo Chang, independent journalist; and Ravi Kapur of WRJK-Chicago shared their best strategies for covering emerging communities on a deadline.
After the session, Hennessy, Chang, and Kapur shared their tips for verifying the authenticity of a source and navigating reporting challenges. Watch the video embedded on the right.
Tips from the session
Four ways to stand out from the competition:
Top tip:
There are tons of free broadcast channels that only require rabbit ears to gain access to ethnic programming. Tuning into these stations will give you a better sense of a community.
Chhaya Nene is a recent graduate of the University of Southern California, where she earned her Master's Degree. Nene's articles and photography have been published in The Washington Post, Religious News Service, The Global Post, NBCLosAngeles.com, and CBSnews.com.
By Trisity Miller
Where there’s a college, there’s a story.
That was the theme of “Campus coverage: College sports,” a panel featuring Paula Lavigne, Jodi Upton, Jill Riepenhoff, and Brad Wolverton.
In recent years there have been several major stories involving college campuses, from the Jerry Sandusky case at Penn State to the recent Jameis Winston rape allegations at Florida State. But wherever there are student athletes, panelists said, there are stories.
“Athletes at all schools have a particular talent of getting arrested,” said Paula Lavigne, an investigative and computer-assisted reporter at ESPN.
Lavigne cited several different locations to find data and documents pertaining to student athletes: campus police, city police, county sheriffs departments, jails, and municipal/county courts.
“You have to know what documents are titled to request them,” said Brad Wolverton, a senior writer at The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Lavigne advised reporters not to solely trust court documents. Many cases never make it to that level due to athletic notoriety.
For one case, Riepenhoff located every courthouse on the path former Ohio State quarterback Terrelle Pryor took during a trip. She searched for traffic reports after getting a tip about athletes and their family members getting expensive cars to drive. She found several arrest records that reflected speeding incidents that never went to court.
When asked how journalists develop sources on college campuses, Jodi Upton, senior database editor at USA TODAY, directed the crowd to look within the university to find someone who will speak out against an athlete, coach or department.
Lavigne also pointed to former athletes who may hold some sort of animosity toward the university or coaching staff.
“Some of the student helpers can be good sources from time to time,” Upton said.
Trisity Miller is a 2014 IRE Conference Knight Scholar. She is a student at Savannah State University.
By Chhaya Nene
These days the phrase “on a budget” applies to everyone, especially journalists. At the 2014 IRE Conference, veteran journalists Anna Hewson of KUSA/9News Denver, Joe Ellis of KXAN-Austin, Bryan Staples of WTVF-Nashville, and Steve Eckert of KARE 11 Minneapolis/St. Paul shared their best-kept secrets for going undercover without blowing the newsroom budget.
After the session, Bryan Staples shared his tips on thrifty undercover reporting. Watch the video embedded on the right.
Here are a few tips from the session:
Must-have equipment:
Five questions to ask before heading out:
Top tip:
Example of an undercover piece done on a budget:
Anna Hewson: http://www.9news.com/video/2863780387001/1/Inside-Story-Roommates-with-benefits-
Chhaya Nene is a recent graduate of the University of Southern California, where she earned her Master's Degree. Nene's articles and photography have been published in The Washington Post, Religious News Service, The Global Post, NBCLosAngeles.com, and CBSnews.com.
By Emily Burns
Friday’s panel on mental health care reporting began with a video clip of the 60 Minutes episode, “Nowhere To Go.” The episode focused on mental health care for young people and featured an interview with Virginia state Sen. Creigh Deeds, who was stabbed by his mentally ill son, Austin, who also took his own life. The day before the stabbing, Austin had gone to a hospital for mental health care, but was not admitted due to a shortage of beds.
Two producers of the episode, Michael Rey and Oriana Zill de Granados, were on the panel and spoke about the episode. Rey said one of the lessons they were trying to impart was the importance of context in mental health stories.
“The more reporting we’re doing when there’s not a school shooting, when there’s not a high-profile event, then the more prepared we are, at least on the television side, to be ready for those moments, to put those incidents in context,” Rey said.
Zill de Granados said mental health stories are good for reporting because they can be emotional and meaningful, but also supported with data and proposed solutions.
“It’s really amazing when you start looking at it, to realize how broken the system really is,” Zill de Granados said.
Brian M. Rosenthal, now a reporter at the Houston Chronicle, was working at the Seattle Times when he wrote multiple stories about mental health care in Washington.
Rosenthal hadn’t reported much on mental health prior to his stories at the Seattle Times, so he spoke about how others can jump into mental health reporting with little background in the subject.
In Rosenthal’s case, he did quick-turn mental health stories while waiting for documents for his larger project. The method is a good way to learn more about the system while also being able to report on different angles, he said. Start working on a big mental health project, he said, and the tips and the anecdotes for other stories will start to flow in.
Rosenthal also suggested utilizing various types of mental health data: rates of commitment, funding information, lengths of stay in treatment, etc.
Meg Kissinger, who has been reporting on mental health for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for decades, also spoke on the panel.
“I think that this has been a public health problem forever,” Kissinger said. “As long as there have been people there have been people with mental illness, and we ignore it at our peril and at the peril of our society, and at the peril of the health of the people that are suffering from this.”
Kissinger also spoke about the difficulty of getting sources to open up about mental illness, but advised that people will eventually speak. She also suggested using mental health advocacy groups as resources.
Emily Burns works as an investigative researcher for inewsource, a media partner of KPBS. Emily also works as an assistant producer at KPBS, the local PBS and NPR affiliate in San Diego.
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