The IRE office will be closed from December 25th to January 5th.
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Kansas City speeders plead to lower offenses
Michael Mansur of The Kansas City Star used computer-assisted analysis of court records to show the court repeatedly allows thousands of speeders and red-light runners to reduce dangerous moving violations to defective-equipment pleas. That means tickets for serious violations are pleaded down to offenses such as broken taillights, which means no points against a driver’s…
Read MoreFlorida law fails in treatment of sexual offenders
Jason Grotto of The Miami Herald analyzed more than 100,000 cases of sexual crimes, reviewed court cases, state records and documents and conducted dozens of interviews to show that seven years after the passage of the Jimmy Ryce Act, Florida’s program for screening, confining and treating the worst sexual offenders is failing. The four-part series…
Read MoreMurderers go unpunished in Newark
Jonathan Schuppe and William Kleinknecht of The (Newark, N.J.) Star-Ledger analyzed homicides in Essex County between 1998 and 2003 and found killers went unpunished more often than they went to prison. In the cases in which a defendant was convicted, more than a quarter led to prison sentences of 10 years or less. “Essex County…
Read MoreFood, tobacco giants share expertise
Patricia Callahan, Jeremy Manier and Delroy Alexander of the Chicago Tribune examined tobacco-lawsuit documents to show that America’s largest foodmaker and its biggest cigarette company have pooled expertise in search of more alluring foods and cigarettes since the dawn of their corporate pairing two decades ago. “Documents show Northfield-based Kraft collaborated on flavor issues with…
Read MoreCharities exploit vulnerable elderly
Jon Burstein of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reviewed more than 700 pages of court documents and sworn statements involving two companies, as well as more than 1,500 pages of financial records obtained by the Attorney General’s Office to show a pattern of telemarketers getting money from senior citizens who seem confused or hearing-impaired. The Global…
Read MoreMiami transit OT draining county budget
Jack Dolan, Larry Lebowitz and Scott Hiaasen of The Miami Herald analyzed local payroll data to find that “transit overtime pay — which is 1.5 times as high as regular hourly rates and cost taxpayers more than $129 million over the last five years — is a long-standing drain on county funds that has persisted…
Read MoreUniversity leader serves on 10 boards
Eleanor Yang of the The San Diego Union-Tribune used calendar records obtained under the California Public Records Act to show that UC San Diego Chancellor, Marye Anne Fox, has served as a director for 10 corporations and nonprofit organizations, while running the university for the past year and a half. Fox spent more than 180…
Read MoreKinko’s deal costly for Dallas schools
Kent Fischer, Pete Slover and Tawnell D. Hobbs of the The Dallas Morning News used district records to show that a plan by Dallas schools to outsource copying and printing to industry giant Kinko’s, started to slash copying and printing expenses by 21 percent, has in fact quadrupled expenses. “Across the entire Dallas Independent School…
Read MoreFlawed criminal justice system
Fredric N. Tulsky, with staff writers Julie Patel and Mike Zapler, data analyst Griff Palmer and research librarian Leigh Poitinger, of the San Jose Mercury News , reviewed every criminal appeal originating out of Santa Clara County Superior Court for five years to show that the Santa Clara County’s criminal justice system is systemically troubled…
Read MoreCity pays millions for bottled water
Cecilia M. Vega of the San Francisco Chronicle used public records to show that San Francisco, owner of a pristine reservoir in the Sierra Nevada with a reputation for producing some of the country’s best-tasting tap water, has spent more than $2 million of taxpayers’ money in the past 4½ years on bottled water. According…
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