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Seymour Hersh to speak at IRE 2009
Seymour Hersh has joined the lineup of speakers at the 2009 IRE Conference. Hersh, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who has exposed scandals and cover-ups for decades — from the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam to Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq — joins a strong group of speakers that also includes Bob Woodward of The…
Read MorePsych hospital mixes up patient meds
Medication errors raise questions about patient safety at a New Jersey psychiatric hospital, according to an Asbury Park Press report by Jean Mikle. A review of hundreds of pages of Ancora medication safety and error reports by the Press found troubling patterns of mistakes and omissions at the facility, which has about 600 patients. The…
Read MoreFlorida ‘Pill Mills’ thrive
A two-part series in The Miami Herald explains how Florida storefront clinics exploit the market for narcotic painkillers. Scott Hiassen reports, “Experts blame these clinics for a startling rise in prescription-drug overdose deaths in Florida, including a 107 percent jump in oxycodone deaths in two years….Yet, regulators and police can’t control the problem — handcuffed,…
Read MoreRed Bull seaplane’s safety questioned
An ABC News investigation by Asa Eslocker, Joseph Rhee and Eric Longabardi examined the safety of the 55-year-old seaplane used by Red Bull to promote its energy drink across the country. The plane was decommissioned by the Coast Guard in 1976, but “it flies over the heads of hundreds of thousands of people a year…
Read MoreNew York’s failing workers’ compensation system
Steven Greenhouse of The New York Times reports on an investigation into New York state’s workers’ compensation system uncovering delays, fraudulent claims, and questionable rulings. Employees feel the system is trying to avoid paying out on claims, while employers believe fraudulent claims are rampant. “A century ago, when the state created its workers’ compensation system,…
Read MorePostal Service pays $1.2 million for mansion
At a time when the U.S. Postal Service is experiencing a financial crisis, it purchased a $1.2 million mansion in South Carolina to relocate an employee. The employee, who applied for the new job — a mid-level manager position — qualified for the purchase under the Postal Service’s relocation policy. It turns out this was…
Read MoreAbsent officers lead to dismissed cases
In a five-month investigation, The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky., looked at court attendance among police officers. Reporters Jason Riley and R.G. Dunlop found, “More than 600 defendants facing such felony charges as drug dealing, robbery, burglary and assault were set free in 2007 because the Louisville Metro Police officers who arrested them failed to appear…
Read MoreStats camp bolsters baseball story
Editor’s note: Rich Exner of The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer attended IRE’s Advanced Statistics Boot Camp at Arizona State University Feb. 6-8. Here’s his take on the practical application of the training: I learned after attending IRE’s Mapping Boot Camp a couple of years ago that the best way to retain the new techniques crammed into…
Read MoreLittle-used Wisconsin bridges get federal stimulus dollars
Ben Poston and Tom Held of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel found that a vast majority of the Wisconsin bridges awarded $15.8 million of construction money in the first wave of federal stimulus funding carry fewer than 1,000 vehicles a day. A dozen of those get less than 100 cars a day. For the story, Poston…
Read More2008 IRE Award winners announced
Investigations that exposed local government corruption from New Orleans to Detroit, human-rights abuses by the federal government and international organized crime are among the work honored in the 2008 Investigative Reporters and Editors Awards. This year’s top prize, the IRE Medal, was given to WWL-New Orleans for its dogged rolling investigation of a city-run housing…
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