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By Doug Haddix, IRE training director A public records request for e-mails sometimes can produce quick-turn watchdog stories with powerful results. Take the experience of John Russell, a business reporter for The Indianapolis Star. Russell sharpened his investigative skills during a two-day IRE watchdog boot camp in Nashville for Gannett employees. The training was one…
Read MoreThe work of reporter Stanley Nelson, of the Concordia (La.) Sentinel, has implicated a man in the unsolved 1964 civil rights murder of Frank Morris. Interviews with three people linked a Richland Parish truck driver to the arson that killed Morris. “The three people, all of them now or previously related to the truck driver,…
Read MoreLong-time IRE member Dunstan “Dusty” McNichol died unexpectedly Tuesday. He was 54. McNichol, who contributed to the IRE Journal and spoke at IRE Conferences, was an active member of IRE since 1998. McNichol covered the New Jersey Statehouse for 10 years for the Star-Ledger “and was part of the team that won a Pulitzer Prize…
Read MoreDespite sanctions and trade embargoes, over the past decade the United States government has allowed American companies to do billions of dollars in business with Iran and other countries blacklisted as state sponsors of terrorism, an examination by Jo Becker of The New York Times has found. Nearly 10,000 licenses for deals involving such countries…
Read MoreJohn Lauerman and Jonathan D. Salant of Bloomberg News found that for-profit colleges, faced with new federal restrictions, more than doubled their lobbying spending, bringing in six former members of Congress to help make their case on Capitol Hill. Ten education companies and their trade association spent $3.8 million on lobbying in the first nine…
Read MoreA Dallas Morning News review of public records and databases found nepotism in charter schools across Texas, along with many administrators earning six-figure salaries to run charter schools with only a few hundred or a couple of thousand students
Read MorePlease do not miss the opportunity to enter your best work in the 2010 IRE Awards. The postmark deadline is Friday, January 14, 2011. The entry form can be found online. Eligible work must have been published or aired between January 1 and December 31, 2010. Please note we have added two new categories in…
Read MoreAn investigation by The New York Times details the final hours of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. Based on interviews with crew members and sworn testimonies, the Times was able to piece together what happened during the final hours of this disaster. “What emerges is a stark and singular fact: crew members died and suffered…
Read MoreAn investigation by the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting shows how high school diplomas received online can be a waste of money and not recognized as valid. According to the report although dozens of organizations accredit schools, “the U.S. higher education community at large only recognizes a handful of accrediting organizations as legitimate.” With little regulation in…
Read MoreAs the number of deportations from county jails increases across the country and in central Ohio, local authorities are struggling to deal with the fallout, a year-long examination by the The Columbus Dispatch found. In a communication mixup, ICE agents deported a witness in a murder trial before he could testify. The accused, a US…
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