The IRE office will be closed from December 25th to January 5th.
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Federal fines go uncollected across the nation
Martha Mendoza and Christopher Sullivan of The Associated Press used federal records to show that the amount of unpaid federal fines has risen sharply in the past decade, in an investigation that examined federal financial penalty enforcement across the nation. Individuals and corporations regularly avoid large penalties for wrongdoing — sometimes through negotiations, sometimes because…
Read MoreHighway patrol policy changed during recall
John Hill of The Sacramento Bee found that the California Highway Patrol repeatedly shut down signature gathering at Department of Motor Vehicle offices across the state in response to the petition drive to recall Gov. Gray Davis in the spring of 2003. The move reversed a long-standing CHP practice of allowing local offices to routinely…
Read MoreExecs benefit from backdating of stock options
Charles Forelle and James Bandler of The Wall Street Journal analyzed grant dates and stock movements and identified several companies with wildly improbable option-grant patterns. “The analysis bolsters recent academic work suggesting that backdating was widespread, particularly from the start of the tech-stock boom in the 1990s through the Sarbanes-Oxley corporate reform act of 2002.…
Read MoreRestraining orders fail to offer protection
Monica Rhor of The Orange County Register surveyed all 58 California counties and found widespread discrepancies in how the state’s restraining order laws are being enforced. The system has become a legal labyrinth in which rules aren’t the same as reality, procedures differ from courthouse to courthouse, and violators often benefit more than victims. “Eleven…
Read MorePublic records difficult to obtain
Abraham Hyatt and Leslie Griffy of The Tribune in San Luis Obispo, Calif., found that cities throughout that county don’t follow state law when it comes to public records requests. “Only one of the county’s seven cities supplied both of the public documents that The Tribune sought. Reporters asked for a directory of city employees’…
Read MoreCode enforcement violations dismissed
Jeff Raymond of The Brownsville Herald examined five years of code enforcement violations — more than 11,000 records overall — to determine the number of cases municipal judges and prosecutors were dismissing and why. The investigation found a disproportionate number of animal-related violations but few cases involving junked homes, rusted appliances in front yards and…
Read MoreDubious charities raise millions
Ronald Campbell of The Orange County Register reviewed more than 10,000 pages of court records, financial reports and other documents and found that former associates of imprisoned charity telemarketing king Mitch Gold have raised more than $83 million in four years for dubious charities. Fundraisers and managers kept almost all the cash, leaving just 7…
Read MoreDam threats in Hawaii underassessed
Karen Blakeman, staff writer with The Honolulu Advertiser, used National Inventory of Dams data from IRE and NICAR for a story about the deadly failure of a privately owned dam on the Hawaii island of Kaua’i. Two bodies have been found and five others are missing. Blakeman reported that state safety inspections of dams across…
Read MoreDonations from gambling interests rise in Kan.
Steve Painter and Brent D. Wistrom of The Wichita Eagle analyzed campaign reports and found gambling contributions to legislative campaigns over six years were up by more than 300 percent, while the same period saw no change in Kansas’ gambling laws. Well-financed gambling interests are waging an increasingly expensive political war over where Kansans will…
Read MoreLA Fire Department faces costly lawsuits
Dan Laidman and Jason Kandel of the Los Angeles Daily News used records from the City Attorney’s Office to show that, despite a decade of efforts to end harassment and discrimination within the Los Angeles Fire Department, the agency still faces frequent costly lawsuits. The number has ebbed and flowed over the years, but rose…
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