CONTENTS

THE IRE JOURNAL 18 - 19 PRISONS: LIBERATING THE TRUTH TABLE OF CONTENTS INMATE HEALTH CARE SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 Officials ignore warning signs; care lacking or too late 4 Graham set standard By Mary Zahn for investigative paper The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel By Brant Houston OUTSIDE EXTORTION Family members forced to 5 NEWS BRIEFS AND MEMBER NEWS pay for inmate safety 6 PHILLY TO HOST By Kathleen Johnston and Gerry Lanosga NATIONAL CAR GATHERING WTHR-TV, Indianapolis By The IRE Journal Staff PRISON BUILDING 8 PLANNING – Projects call for Construction increases as system, shared newsroom input incarceration declines By Bill Sizemore By Dan Meyers The Virginan-Pilot The Denver Post 10 HIGHER EDUCATIONS DEATH ROW DEFENSE Analyzing the financial pressures Indigent inmates on small colleges get poor representation By Dianne Jennings By Jim O’Neill The Dallas Morning News The Philadelphia Inquirer 12 WHISTLEBLOWER HIGH-SECURITY SECRETS Knowing when, where and how to Using grapevine to uncover handle a key source supermax snitch unit By Alan Prendergast By Kate Miller 10 for The IRE Journal Westword 14 BENEVOLENT SCAM 31 FEN-PHEN STORY PROVIDES Solicitation pros mar fundraising GLIMPSE AT HOW DOCTORS, by police, firefighters DRUG MAKERS THINK By David Migoya By Steve Weinberg The Denver Post The IRE Journal 16 EXTENSIVE PUBLIC RECORDS 33 LEGAL CORNER SEARCH LEADS TO PENSION Electronic records threaten FOIA FUND FRAUD STORIES By Stephanie S. Abrutyn By Jack Meyers the Boston Herald ABOUT THE COVER Cell block C at the Powhatan Correctional Center in Powhatan County,Va. Cover story, page 18-19

Cover photo by Bill Tiernan, The Virginian-Pilot Cover design by Wendy Gray, The IRE Journal

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 3 THE IRE JOURNAL FROM THE IRE OFFICES VOLUME 24 NUMBER 5 Graham set standard DIRECTOR OF PUBLICATIONS & EDITOR Len Bruzzese for investigative paper MANAGING EDITOR Anita Bruzzese

ART DIRECTOR or many investigative journalists who never personally knew Wendy Gray her, the death of Katharine Graham this past summer was BRANT HOUSTON F a deep loss. SENIOR CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Steve Weinberg Her fortitude as publisher and CEO of The Washington Post set a standard 30 years ago when she gave the go-ahead to publish the Pentagon Papers and then again backed CONTRIBUTING LEGAL EDITOR her newsroom during the Watergate investigation. David Smallman Those two examples alone would make her the godmother of modern investigative EDITORIAL INTERN reporting. But her continued support of digging, hard-hitting stories at The Post Jamie Manfuso encouraged generations of journalists at other news organizations to pursue unpopular, yet critical investigations. Katharine Graham was the example of the courageous journalist as publisher. It IRE doesn’t take long for an editor or reporter to know that some stories won’t see the light of day – no matter how good the stories are – unless a publisher can rebuff the threats of IRE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Brant Houston the powerful who are under scrutiny. In a time of media consolidations and immense Wall Street pressures on newsrooms, BOARD OF DIRECTORS some friends in journalism have worried that the passing of Katharine Graham is one more sign of the decline of an era of tough, aggressive work. CHAIRMAN But Graham’s legacy is the inspiration she gave – and will continue to give – to James Neff, The Seattle Times investigative journalists to carry on, because she showed that even in the most difficult of PRESIDENT times there will be someone who will go with the story. David Dietz, Bloomberg News On-the-road plans VICE PRESIDENT Shawn McIntosh, The Clarion-Ledger The cuts in newsroom budgets for training and travel have made us more intent than ever on getting IRE’s training and resources to its members and all journalists. TREASURER Thus, we have planned a busy year on the road, often in collaboration with other Joel Kaplan, Syracuse University organizations. You can keep up with additions to the schedule by checking our Web site SECRETARY at www.ire.org/training, but here are some of our plans: Ed Delaney, Barnes and Thornburg • A series of 10 one-day investigative workshops around the country for journalists at Paul Adrian, KDFW-Dallas small to medium news organizations. David Boardman, The Seattle Times • Seminars on computer-assisted reporting at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., James V. Grimaldi, The Washington Post and at the Medill School of Journalism news bureau there. Chris Heinbaugh, WFAA-Dallas • Two-day regional workshops on using census data. Cheryl Phillips, USA Today Duane Pohlman, WEWS-Cleveland • Two-day regional workshops on campaign finance issues at the community level. Stephen Miller, The New York Times • Regional conferences in Washington, D.C., Savannah, Ga., and Charlotte, N.C. Mark Rochester, Newsday • A regional conference with our colleagues in Mexico to be held in Juarez during November. Stuart Watson, WCNC-Charlotte • The IRE National Conference next June in San Francisco • Workshops with state capitol reporters, publishers of African-American community The IRE Journal (ISSN0164-7016) is pub- newspapers, education writers and religion writers. lished six times a year by Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. 138 Neff If you are interested in getting a workshop to your area, please contact Ron Nixon, Annex, Missouri School of Journalism, IRE’s training director, at [email protected] or call 573-882-2042. Columbia, MO 65211, 573-882-2042. E-mail: [email protected]. Subscriptions are Keeping up to date $60 in the U.S., $70 for institutions and those outside the U.S. Periodical postage paid At the same time, we continue to build our Web site and publications so that at Columbia, MO. Postmaster: Please send CONTINUED ON PAGE 35 × address changes to IRE. USPS #4516708 Brant Houston is executive director of IRE and the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting. He can be reached through e-mail at [email protected] or by calling 573-882-2042.

4 THE IRE JOURNAL I R E N E W S Strong member showing New CFIC director MEMBER NEWS in Best of the West named for IRE, NICAR Ten IRE members were among the winners Aron Pilhofer has joined IRE and NICAR as the RE members were on the winning teams of this year’s Best of the West awards. new director of the Campaign Finance Information I in each newspaper category of the 2001 In broadcast, producer Eric Longabardi and Center. Before joining IRE, he was the computer- Gerald Loeb Awards for Business and Finan- reporter Vince Gonzales of KCBS-Los Angeles assisted reporting coordinator for The News Journal took first place in the investigative reporting in Wilmington, Del., where he helped lead the cial Journalism. Mark Katches and Ronald category for their series, “Biowar,” about the paper’s census coverage, among other projects. Campbell of The Orange County Register Prior to that, he covered state politics and the New U.S. Navy using its own sailors in biological were part of the winning team in the large warfare experiments 35 years ago. Jersey Legislature from the Gannett state bureau in Ross McLaughlin, of KIRO-Seattle, had two Trenton. He replaces Ron Nixon, who moved into newspaper category for “The Body Bro- winning investigations. “Odometer Rollbacks” IRE’s training director position. kers.” Jim Leusner of The Orlando Sentinel took top honors in consumer reporting, and MaryJo Sylwester, former IRE and NICAR was part of the team winning the medium “Canada Drugs,” which told how Americans Database Library administrator, has been hired were taking bus trips to Canada for prescription to manage computer-assisted reporting for the newspaper category for “Government Inc.” drugs, won for series reporting. Center for Public Integrity in Washington, D.C. Bruce Rushton of the Riverfront Times In newspapers, Rick Tulsky, of the San She will work with reporters to obtain and analyze (St. Louis) won the small newspaper cat- Jose Mercury News, tied for first place in data for various projects, including The 50 States investigative reporting for his examination of Project, federal investigations and the center’s egory for his report “Porn in the USA.” the U.S. political asylum system. He shared online newsletter. Her primary assignment will be Andy Lehren, Allan Maraynes, Neal first place with David Parrish and Ryan Konig to oversee analysis and reporting of an investigation Shapiro and Mable Chan were on a team of The Arizona Republic, who investigated the of soft money contributions and expenditures by that won the Edward R. Murrow National flawed disciplinary system for doctors. state lawmakers in all 50 states. Kim Christensen and Brent Walth were Latest issue of Tracker Award for network television for “The part of a team at The Oregonian in Portland Paper Chase,” an hour-long newscast that that won first place in explanatory reporting available via the Web revealed a disturbing pattern in State for a series on injustices at the Immigration The latest issue of Tracker, the newsletter for and Naturalization Service. The series won the Campaign Finance Information Center, is Farm’s insurance handling practices. The the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service earlier now available at www.campaignfinance.org/. The same investigation also won a duPont- electronic newsletter contains stories written by in the year. Columbia Silver Baton, a Gerald Loeb Thomas J. Cole, of the Albuquerque Journal, reporters working with campaign finance records. was on a three-person team that won first place They share tips and tactics for tackling these often Award, a Peabody Award, and an IRE Cer- in project reporting for “Betrayal of Trust,” an complex pieces. tificate. David Raziq and Anna Werner This issue includes a story by Jeff South of investigation into substandard care for child of KHOU-TV in Houston won the Edward leukemia patients at the University of New Virginia Commonwealth University explaining Mexico. how his students analyzed all gifts received last R. Murrow Award for local investigative Alan Prendergast of Westword in Denver year by state legislators, the governor and other top reporting for their Firestone tire series. officials in Virginia. took first place in long-form feature writing This year that same investigation also won for his profile of Aspen high school students UPDATES the IRE Award, the duPont-Columbia Silver and recent graduates from prominent Aspen Florida Today’s recent series on Florida’s deadly families who committed a string of crimes and stretch of Interstate 95 – detailed in the last edition of Baton, the Peabody, the George Polk, the were imprisoned for it. The IRE Journal – has resulted in some state action. National Headliners, the Scripps Howard, A state study following the series bolstered the the Sigma Delta Chi, and the National Regional conferences paper’s findings, and in August, the state transporta- Press Club awards. Another 2001 duPont- set for D.C., Savannah tion secretary approved a district request for $2.5 Two-day regional conferences are being million to improve two dangerous stretches. Columbia award winner: Eric Longabardi planned for early 2002 in Washington, D.C., As a follow to the South Florida Sun Sentinel’s produced and Vince Gonzales reported and Savannah, Ga. The conferences will feature “Crashing for Cash” story detailed in the last edition CBS Evening News’ “Armed America” report, reporting and editing panels as well as some of The IRE Journal, Bill Conroy of the San Antonio hands-on training in computer-assisted report- Business Journal reminds fellow members that which won a silver baton. Lisa Verch and ing. the FBI has been accused of racial profiling in Denise Clodjeaux, of KEZI-Eugene, Ore., The Washington, D.C., conference will be such insurance fraud investigations. Past stories CONTINUED ON PAGE 34 × held at the National Press Club on Jan 25-26. also have pointed to the links between the FBI and Plans are still being finalized for Savannah, but Send Member News items to Len Bruzzese at the insurance industry-funded National Insurance [email protected] and include a phone number for the event is likely to be in early April. Crime Bureau. See stories 16032 and 17661 from verification. the IRE Resource Center.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 5 I R E N E W S PANELS PHILLY Check www.ire.org/training/philly for the latest changes and updates, but for now, TO HOST here are some of the planned panels: OVERVIEWS NATIONAL CAR • Quick Turnaround on Stories Using CAR: Examples and strategies GATHERING • Latest in CAR Trends: From quick hits to big projects • New and Exciting Data: Where it is, how to find it BY THE IRE JOURNAL STAFF BEGINNER TRACK • Getting Started: Weaving CAR into the beat • CAR Skills Every Reporter Must Have • The Lingo and Hardware of CAR RE’s National Computer-Assisted State University and Paul Overberg of USA • Getting Data from the Web Reporting Conference in October will Today will coordinate the sessions on the include a special focus this year on census. BROADCASTER TRACK I analyzing census data and mapping. In addition to the tracks of panels on • Online Sites for Fast-Breaking Broadcast Overall, the conference at the Loews Hotel in mapping, there will be special tracks for: Stories Philadelphia will offer journalists just start- • TV and Print: Working Collaboratively more than 60 panels and ing in computer- • CAR Stories that Work for TV: Finding workshops – and four Conference: assisted reporting Visuals days of hands-on train- National Computer-Assisted efficiently searching ON THE BEAT ing for beginners and Reporting Conference and using on-line advanced users. resources • Evaluating Crime in Your Community Oct. 11-14, 2001 Guest speakers will managing CAR in • Judging the Cops include John Allen Philadelphia the newsroom • Education: Measuring tests and student Paulos, author of “Innu- Loews Philadelphia Hotel constructing effec- performance meracy: A Mathemati- tive intranets • Education: Funding equity, teacher cre- cian Reads the Newspa- dentials per” and other books; Mark Monmonier, More than 50 hands-on classes, taught • Transportation: Planes, trains and killer author of “How to Lie with Maps”; and by some of the best practitioners in the tires Philip Meyer, author of “The New Precision country, will cover the basics and the Journalism.” more advanced skills including: • Elderly: Nursing homes, home health care • Energy Data Co-hosted by The Philadelphia Inquirer, Beginning and the conference will take advanced spreadsheets • Environment: Local waterways and water place Oct. 11-14, a Costs: (Excel) quality Thursday through Registration: $150 Beginning and • Insurance Fraud: Car, Home, Medical — Sunday. The Gannett (students, $100) advanced database hidden data Foundation and Knight managers (Access) • Sports: Make CAR part of the team To attend, Ridder are major spon- Practical math: • Local Government: Measuring Waste and membership must be current. sors of the conference. Ratios, rates and Corruption This year, the confer- See www.ire.org/training/philly indexes • Campaign Finance: Going local ence planners are put- Data cleaning for latest details • Local Property: Taxes, scams and lending ting together a series of Searches on the Inter- demonstrations of new net and downloading • Digging for Statehouse Stories software and hardware that can help journal- from the Internet • Children: Day care, lead poisoning, foster ists as they gather news. There also will be Understanding how your computer han- care small roundtable workshops on specific topics dles data • Racial and Ethnic Disparities: Policing, such as putting maps online, strategies for Mapping redlining, immigration small to medium news organizations, and The power of structured query language • Legal and Illegal Drugs: Using local, state teaching CAR both in the university and in Dealing with SQL servers and federal data the newsroom. Experts Steve Doig of Arizona Basic statistics CONTINUED ON PAGE 30 ×

6 THE IRE JOURNAL National Computer-Assisted Reporting Conference Philadelphia, Pa. • October 11-14, 2001

More than 50 panels that touch on every beat: Census, law enforcement, transportation, education, local government, health and more Hands-on classes: Spreadsheets, databases, mapping, SPSS, SAS Internet training: Important Web sites, search techniques no reporter can do without, backgrounding people and businesses online PLUS! Exhibitors, networking and computer software demonstrations

Hosted by: The Philadelphia Inquirer, Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. and the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting Sponsors include: The Gannett Foundation and Knight Ridder

REGISTRATION FORM. To register, please complete this form. Visit our Web site at www.ire.org or call 573-882-2042 for the latest details. Please write carefully! This information will be used to make your nametag.

Name: ______To attend this conference, you must be a current IRE member through Employer/Affiliation/School: ______11/1/01. Memberships are non-refundable.

Address:______$150 I’m an IRE professional member and would like to attend the conference October ______11-14.

City, State: ______Zip: ______–______$100 I’m an IRE student member and would like to attend the conference October Office Phone(required) :______E-mail (required):______11-14.

Home Phone: ______Fax: ______$200 I would like to attend the conference October 11-14 and need to join or renew my To register, mail this form and a check to IRE, 138 Neff Annex, Missouri School of Journalism, U.S. membership. Columbia, MO, 65211. To register by credit card, you must have a Visa or MasterCard. We cannot accept American Express. You may fax your credit card registration to (573) 882-5431 or register ____$205 I would like to attend the conference online at www.ire.org/training/philly. October 11-14 and need to join or renew my international membership. Cancellations need to be sent via e-mail to [email protected]. There is a $50 processing fee for all ____$125 I would like to attend the conference cancellations until October 10, 2001. Refunds will not be given for cancellations after October 10. October 11-14 and need to join or renew my student membership. Card Number:______Expiration Date:______$25 Late fee for registrations postmarked Card Holder Name:______or faxed after September 17.

Card Holder Signature:______TOTAL $______FEATURES

Reporting (NICAR), and several reporters who knew their way around a relational PLANNING database, we really hadn’t harnessed that talent effectively or spread the CAR culture. Then, nearly four years after the old team died, with a renewed emphasis on project BASICS reporting from the top brass, I attended an IRE and NICAR Boot Camp for Editors. I Projects call for system, came away with some brushed-up skills and, shared newsroom input maybe more importantly, some ideas about how to help instill an investigative culture BY DAN MEYERS in the newsroom. And, again, so nobody THE DENVER POST here frags me: There were fine editors and reporters here. Just little or no system, at the time. ou prepare a really good series and Sound familiar? So I tried to stuff more of the database at the last minute discover that: For years, The Denver Post has done some manager Access into my brain at NICAR but A. You have enough photos for two days. fine investigative and projects journalism, and spent much of the time asking what worked Y Your series will run three days. and what didn’t in terms of developing a so have you. But we did it without much of a B. Ditto on graphics. system – thus, without much consistency. For culture, a habit, a routine of doing deeper, C. The layout person looks at your budget of a while in the mid-1990s, we had a projects precision journalism, and doing it throughout stories for Sunday and informs you that team that inspired at least as much resent- the news departments. What structure? What there is room for three stories. You’ve ment as support. Among other problems, the stories? Training? The answers I got at NICAR written five. team was only faintly connected to the other from Brant Houston, Jo Craven McGinty, Tom D. That great writer in the features section reporters or editors in the newsroom. It was McGinty and Sarah Cohen, among others, published a similar story last year. disbanded in 1996 for a variety of reasons. helped. Then it was a matter of fitting those E. There are terrific online possibilities, with While The Post did have a skilled com- lessons, and whatever else I could figure out, links to documents and experts. You’ve puter-assisted reporting practitioner in Jeff to this place. explored none of them. Roberts, who is a boot camp alum of IRE and F. All the above. the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Ideas that help The following ideas are the basics for us. Some will be snoringly obvious to some Powerful Research Tools people. Some won’t work in your shop. Or maybe you do it better. But for others, this, For Investigative Reporting or part of this, might help. • Explain. Last summer, Post Editor Glenn Guzzo created a projects team headed by Jeff Roberts and me, with two reporters The Next Generation of Online Research and a mandate to work with reporters in all departments. I expected the announcement Investigative Reporters working in QuickInfo is a collection of highly to be met with cheers. Instead, people were both print and broadcast media turn to searchable regional and state-level annoyed. So Jeff and I held a series of FlatRateInfo.com and QuickInfo.net public records datasets. Subscribing to one or both gets you unlimited searches brown-bag lunch meetings, explaining the to find out more about the people, at one low flat rate. approach, underscoring that this was good companies and institutions they need for everyone and offering help in training. to know more about. Monthly, quarterly and annual subscrip- We also got some good ideas that helped us tions are available. move forward. FlatRateInfo provides access to national • Train. You think all you need is a course or public records datasets and also allows Call today to set up a FREE 2 day live two on ArcView GIS? Hah. Your newsroom hands-on demo of both products! journalists to use its powerful National is replete with reporters striving mightily to People Locator. hide the fact that they don’t know how to Call toll free today 1-888-259-6173 to set use the Internet. Jeff and I, once we figured this out, created our own boot camp and up your FREE 2 day demo! have brought at least a dozen journalists FlatRateInfo.com and QuickInfo.net are Products of e-InfoData.com – reporters, editors and someone from the copy desk – up to speed.

8 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES

• Include. Jeff and I convened a “projects their ability to work with other reporters. It’s group” with representatives from all parts of paid off with a suggestion here, a database the editorial operation, including the library tweak there, and general acceptance that we’re and online folks. Inclusion rules: If the news here to help, not to steal a story. desk is going to have to lay out and read your fabulous series, you’re a lot better off Get into print including them from the get-go. Graphics, Now, some grubby advice: Choose projects photo, online – the same applies. Beyond with a range of complexity. Which is a that practical argument, good ideas can and fancy way of saying be ready to get some will come from anywhere. Why exclude? stories out fairly quickly. That’s the way • Organize. I know this is a newsroom politics works, hateful word for journal- Editor boot camps especially those without ists. But really, it’s best vast resources, which is to develop a system. The IRE and NICAR hold annual most of us. broader projects group boot camps specifically The Post team has spent lots of time on aimed at editors, news direc- come under pressure how we could encourage tors and others directing because we launched ideas from everywhere, overall newsroom coverage huge efforts first. Politi- and how we could lend or daily assignments. cally, maybe we should the core expertise of the More information can be have landed more stories projects team to others. found at www.ire.org/ quicker, the better to with- We came up with a writ- training/editorbootcamps stand pressures of budget, ten plan – which was dis- staffing and impatience. on these 3 1⁄2-day sessions. tributed to department This has complicated my heads and anyone else we efforts to add a third proj- could find – that expressly invited ideas and ects team member. And it has tempted higher- outlined how they’d be handled. We created ups to dilute the efforts of the projects team a separate system of tracking deadlines and with other assignments. (At the same time, I responsibilities. urge you to volunteer to help out whenever • Be kind. The gist of our approach is to possible with daily and weekly planning and ensure that reporters and others who propose stories. Pick up a city desk shift when they’re ideas won’t be eviscerated in the process. crunched. Say yes when someone asks you to Too often, ideas are ignored or slapped help with a daily census story or suggest how around. Here, everyone with a proposal gets to use a database to beef up a story. Don’t a serious response and a full understanding isolate yourself). (in writing, even) of what it’ll take to get Basically, our system tries to invite ideas, approval. explain what’s needed and, if things gel, call • Involve the brass. Nobody likes surprises, for the idea to be presented to the projects especially the people who approve your group by those who thought it up. Once the budgets and get those three open inside group approves and the higher-ups sign off, pages for you. And even high-ranking editors a smaller group that includes the reporter can have good ideas. Really. So tell them and editor, photo, graphics, the news desk, what you’re doing and even – gasp – seek the library and online, herd it through. The their opinions. managing editor sits in on many of our broader • Communicate. We created an e-mail group meetings and always has a list of what’s in the to keep everyone posted. Before meetings works. The editor gets that list too. I’d send out a reminder or two, with a look It will take at least twice as long as you at the subjects to be covered. After meetings, think just to set things up. Don’t wait until everyone gets a summary with follow-up every detail is nailed down to start. Just start. needs noted. It is too early to say this is an unqualified • Meet often. We gather once every two or success. But clearly, with everyone invested in three weeks to talk things over. The meetings the process, we’ve launched something good. mercifully, are getting shorter. They’re Now we have to change it to make it better. worth it. Maybe you have some ideas? We chose the reporters for the projects team for their substantial skills but also for Dan Meyers is metro editor at The Denver Post.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 9 FEATURES

are facing these days – pressures that became the focus of a six-part series The Inquirer ran HIGHER in January. These financial pressures, some experts say, will put many small colleges out of business. EDUCATIONS The project didn’t start out as a “project.” Initially I merely wanted to see what financial Analyzing the financial pressures data I could compile on area colleges, to get on small colleges a sense of their relative financial strength. As a starting point, I requested from 45 private BY JIM O’NEILL colleges in eastern Pennsylvania four years’ THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER worth of 990 forms – financial documents that nonprofits file each year with the Internal Revenue Service to maintain tax-exempt status. he press releases washed over the programs – except these new majors all had (The nonprofits must share the documents with desk in mundane waves of paper. a job-specific focus, the antithesis of the the public on request.) None merited a story on its own, traditional liberal arts. Alletta Emeno, of The Inquirer’s computer- T but rather hinted at a burgeoning And a few sources murmured that compet- assisted reporting team, created a template on trend. Every other week, it seemed, another ing schools were struggling financially – and our in-house computer network that let me college was announcing the ribbon-cutting for drastically discounting tuition to boost sagging type data from each 990 form into an internal a multimillion dollar temple to technology enrollment. database. Alletta then helped me download the complete with “smart” classrooms. None of these frayed strands of information data into an Excel spreadsheet. That let me At the same time, colleges were issuing seemed directly related, but ultimately they slice and dice the data any way I saw fit. I a blizzard of potentially yawn-inducing proved to be symptoms of the intense new included not only the financial data from the announcements about new majors and degree financial pressures that small private colleges 990 forms – annual revenue, expenses, assets, The Philadelphia Inquirer Philadelphia The

Ron Tarver Tarver Ron

Cabrini College student Dave Tola directs fellows students through a commercial he was required to produce for a video class. Cabrini has spent thousands on building a state of the art video facility.

10 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES debt, bonded debt, the value of a school’s investments – but also enrollment data supplied by the Pennsylvania Department of Education. A cursory look at the numbers showed that some schools suffered enrollment declines and deficits through the late 1990s, despite a The Philadelphia Inquirer Philadelphia The booming economy and increased demand for higher education. What was going on?

Converting key ratios Tarver Ron As the data poured in, I spoke to higher education experts about financial trends. A few themes emerged – growing student interest in job-specific majors made the liberal arts a harder sell; schools using more merit aid to boost enrollment were undercutting their main revenue source; schools trying to offset losses in undergraduate programs were jumping into the already competitive adult learner market. Back to the data. I figured college finance officers must use benchmarks to gauge their institution’s relative health – something more sophisticated than merely comparing endow- ments or debt per student. Then another press release provided the answer. It was from KPMG and Prager, McCar- thy & Sealy, two financial services companies that count colleges among their clients. The release touted a book the companies produce for college finance officials. The title – “Ratio Analysis in Higher Education: Measuring Past Performance to Chart Future Direction” – ensures it won’t make the bestseller lists. Dry as it was, it proved a godsend. The book outlines financial ratios college officers can use, comparing, for instance, a college’s change in net assets to total net assets, or expendable net assets to long-term debt. Aside from the eye-glazing language, there was one problem – the data that colleges plug into the formulas to determine each ratio are best gleaned from their own audited financial statements. Colleges are not obligated to share these with the public. The only consistent, Cedar Crest College president Dorothy Gulbenkian Blaney watches as Beverly Green prepares for an experiment in the genetics lab located in the Miller Building. complete source of financial data I had was the 990 forms. Yet the accounting procedures to fill them out vary from those for audited I plugged the numbers into the ratio formulas. part of a huge graphic when the series ran, statements. The formulas looked something like this (the which is also included on The Inquirer’s Web To figure out which lines in the 990 forms numbers represent lines in the 990 form): 67 site (http://inq.philly.com). I made sure to had the appropriate data to plug into the ratio + 68 - [57c - (64a + 64b)] / 17. Doesn’t look include four years’ worth of grades for each formulas, I sought out experts. Folks at KPMG pretty, but it worked. school, to show a trend line and avoid false helped. I also bounced assumptions off an The KPMG book also provided a way to conclusions based on a single year of data. experienced finance officer at a healthy private take key ratios and convert them to an overall Once I had the ratios and the composite college. These experts steered me away from financial grade for each school – a great way to financial grade for each school, I met with potential errors. give readers a clear comparison of the colleges’ officials at colleges with the weakest financial

Finally, using the database we had compiled, financial health. The financial grades became CONTINUED ON PAGE 32 ×

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 11 FEATURES

source McGraw worked with was a successful WHISTLEBLOWER engineer when he decided to blow the whistle on the government agency he worked for. The last McGraw heard of him he was working on Knowing when, where and how the back of a garbage truck. to handle a key source Advocates for whistleblowers warn there is no comprehensive federal law protecting whistleblowers from retaliation. The few federal BY KATE MILLER laws that do exist apply mostly to workers in FOR THE IRE JOURNAL specific industries or who have divulged specific types of information such as environmental regulation violations. hen a whistleblower comes to Justice Department employee who was coura- Even the most famous of these laws, the Chicago Sun-Times reporter geous enough and caring enough to follow his Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989, applies Charles Nicodemus, one of the conscience even though he was violating the only to federal employees. Under the act, most W first things he tells them is “I’ll law,” he says. go to jail to protect your identity.” Because whistleblowers often divulge con- cases go before the Merit Systems Protection He means it. fidential information that powerful bureaucrats Board, which is described as “the worst enemy In 1989, Nicodemus was put to the test when and executives don’t want revealed, it is usually whistleblowers have” by Tom Carpenter of the U.S. marshals showed up at the Sun-Times office not the journalists who have the most to lose. Government Accountability Project (GAP). demanding to see him and another reporter who In fact, reporters who have been in these The majority of states have passed their own had exposed a controversial CIA and FBI intel- tough situations agree it is imperative that whistleblower protection laws, but protection ligence operation. The duo had used confidential whistleblowers know what’s at stake before under these laws varies as well. Carpenter says CIA and Justice Department files leaked by their information is used. whistleblowers are often only protected if they a Justice Department employee. The federal Mike McGraw, of The Kansas City Star, says are terminated or if the divulged information government wanted the reporters to testify. he tells them “that if I quote you by name in the affects “public policy.” Knowing they were wanted, Nicodemus and story you could get fired, and you could have It’s clear that whistleblowing is risky busi- his partner stayed away from the office and their trouble getting another job. It could affect your ness, but The Olympian’s Lorrie Thompson in homes for weeks until the marshals gave up income. It could affect your family life.” Olympia, Wash., says reporters can sometimes looking. Nicodemus says that even if things “It’s amazing how few people back out, but improve the whistleblower’s situation, particu- had turned out differently, it would not have you’ve got to be honest with them,” McGraw larly if the source is already in deep trouble. weakened his resolve to protect his source. says. Thompson says the first whistleblower she “I’d have died before I ever identified that The warning is not an exaggeration. One ever dealt with was an Army jumpmaster who accused his superiors of contract fraud involving supply procurement. Sgt. 1st Class Paul Paine FINDING WHISTLEBLOWERS endured two years of Army retaliation before his By Kate Miller wife contacted Thompson and handed over piles of documentation supporting his case. Looking to connect with potential whistleblowers? Thompson says the couple realized soon after Try these strategies that might lead to a source: the first article was published that talking to her • Look at the complaints filed with The National • Find employees who have left a company actually offered some protection. Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The NLRB or agency by comparing old and new inter- is a federal agency that investigates and nal directories. The same can be done with “Every time they did something to Paul, they prosecutes unfair practices involving union payroll records. would call me and we’d do a little story on it,” and nonunion employees and employers as Thompson says. well as unions and members. The NLRB has • Check out company newsletters and old broad jurisdiction over the private sector. The newspapers. This can be a good way to find Thompson says not every tip resulted in Federal Labor Relations Authority provides the names of employees and members if the a story, but there were enough newsworthy the same services for federal, state and local rosters are closed to the public. events to draw the attention of high-ranking government employees. • Merit protection boards, unions, and state officials. Paine eventually was forced to retire • The Occupational Safety and Health Admin- licensing and permit bureaus can all turn up from the Army, but not before receiving a double istration (OSHA) is an arm of the U.S. Labor sources. Don’t forget to talk to lawyers who promotion to sergeant major and back pay. Department that investigates employee have sued a certain company or agency, or complaints of health and safety violations bankers who have been involved with an by employers. organization. The invaluable crank Journalists who’ve worked with multiple • FOIA requests. Old FOIA requests can lead • With some legwork, other sources may be whistleblowers say they are often not the easiest you to others interested in your subject. found by talking to ex-spouses of employ- Filing a FOIA request of your own can let ees, residents living near a business, and people to deal with. But even the most eccentric potential whistleblowers in the agency know employees hanging out at favorite restau- and seemingly insane sources can prove invalu- you are interested in a certain area. rants and bars. able if given a chance.

12 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES

“I’ve dealt with whistleblowers who are “Keep in mind they all have an ax to grind, absolutely stark raving mad, crazy people,” they all have their own agenda and they’re all WHISTLEBLOWER McGraw says. “A lot of people won’t talk to trying to use us,” he says. “But whistleblowers them, but I’ll talk to anybody. I’ll talk to them have no more of an agenda and no stronger WISDOM because everybody knows stuff and a lot of incentive to lie than the mayor does in many people don’t realize what they know.” cases.” Those who have handled Eric Nalder of the San Jose Mercury News Nicodemus suggests another reason for the day-to-day dealings with agrees, recalling the time he received a tip editors’ reluctance. whistleblowers offer some while at The Seattle Times about problems in “Supervisors are part of management and additional insight: Washington’s mental health system from an management is often made uncomfortable by actual client. Nalder says that while the source people ratting on management elsewhere,” he • “Remember, especially when it was a little difficult to talk to “for obvious says. comes to government, that when reasons,” the interview still gave him a front- But even if you are interested in talking whistleblowers come forward there page story about a system head assaulting a to whisteblowers, it doesn’t mean they come is a tendency in the bureaucracy – secretary. knocking on your door every day. Niccodemus At the same time, even if whistleblowers and Nalder say whistleblowers can be lured into and it’s a mean-streak in the bureau- aren’t completely nuts, some eccentric personali- the open by writing stories about problems at cracy – to make them suffer for ties can make getting information a challenge. agencies or institutions. Potential whistleblowers what they say and how they look. Deborah Nelson of The Washington Post says need to see that a journalist is interested in the I’ve seen whistleblowers who’ve a fair number of whistleblowers that she has subject and can responsibly handle any offered really believed they were doing the dealt with share common characteristics, such information. right thing down to their very core as being “really good record keepers and fact For example, Nelson says that she began and the system retaliated. They are gatherers. asking to review agency documents rather driven to the edge mentally.” “But they’re not necessarily the best at than copy them because it would save time – Mike McGraw presenting those facts in a usual way,” Nelson and money. She soon discovered, however, says. “It takes patience to get them to sit down that hanging around the agency office for a and get them to tell a chronological story that couple of days brought whistleblowers out of • “If you get a tip that someone has gives their complaint some sort of structure.” the woodwork. pretty significant information, it’s Nalder does what he calls “strip mining,” an “If you hang around for awhile, they get a important to get to them right away extensive interview in which he asks the source sense that you’re truly interested in figuring out because people who are wanting to take him through the events chronologically what’s wrong,” Nelson says. to get information to the public and in what he calls “a,b,c,d logic.” Nalder says Nalder adds that filing FOIA requests is are usually pretty impatient to do forcing sources to give information this way another good way to get out the names and so. If they are anxious to get it to numbers of interested reporters who would like not only makes the information understandable, the public they will go to someone but also can reveal lies, manipulations and to talk to whistleblowers. else if they don’t think you’re inter- misrepresentations. Once a whistleblower is found, one of the ested.” “Sometimes it’s a mistake, and they’ll go most important things to remember is that they back and fill it in; sometimes they are hiding are not the whole story. Regardless of how – Eric Nalder something they don’t want to tell you,” he says. trustworthy the whistleblower may appear, these “Insisting that they follow a,b,c,d logic will go a reporters stress they would never rely only on • “Be brave enough – and patient long way in getting them to give information they a whistleblower’s word, and would insist on enough – to work with unorthodox don’t realize they have and getting an accurate – further documentation. personalities, even if your editors instead of a manipulative – story.” “To me it’s suicidal to depend on information or your colleagues don’t like them, McGraw says he conducts a “truth test” with from a whistleblower that can’t be confirmed in don’t respect them, don’t trust some other way,” Nicodemus says. his whistleblowers by gathering information them, may belittle them, and may independently thorough documents or other Says Thompson: “Even if they have a really belittle you for trying to work with sources, and then asks the whistleblower for great story that they can’t prove with documenta- answers he has already discovered. tion, you have to throw it out the window.” them.” “You have to be careful,” Thompson says. – Charles Nicodemus Management bias “What they’re handing you is what they want Still, proving the reliability of a whistleblower to hand you. What’s out there that they’re not • “Focus on things you can prove. It’s to a reporter is often much easier than trying to telling me?” a little bit more like being a police convince an editor of the same thing, a fact which officer than a reporter.” bothers McGraw. He says that whistleblowers Kate Miller, a former editorial intern for The IRE Journal, now works for the Memphis Business – Lorrie Thompson are no different than any other source when it Journal. comes to motive and bias.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 13 FEATURES

What struck a nerve, though, was that few of the newspaper accounts going back 15 BENEVOLENT years had probed past the initial solicitations to find out what happened to the dollars the solicitors actually passed on to the badge SCAM groups. A perusal of state laws told us that solici- tors had to register with the secretary of state. Solicitation pros mar fundraising Not uncommon across the country, as we found. The secretary of state, however, only by police, firefighters had records for the current year’s solicitation campaigns, most of which didn’t include any financial accounting of what the solicitor did with the money it raised. A trip to the state archives dropped us BY DAVID MIGOYA into pay dirt. We asked for a single record and the clerk produced four boxes, saying the THE DENVER POST document we sought was inside somewhere. All we had to do was find it. The first box yielded an index of all the records that the boxes held, broken down hen The Denver Post decided to So, we followed the money – from the by group name. That’s when it occurred to take a hard look at how police moment it left a contributor’s hand to the us that there was a larger story to be told. and firefighter organizations – moment the last of it was spent by the group We found the group’s records we sought and Wcalled “badge groups” – solicit that got it. noticed there 63 others just like them, by money from the public, we needed to make The dollar’s journey, and the various far the largest segment of all the types of sure readers easily understood what actually pieces of it that were torn off along the way, solicitations that were registered. happened to their contribution. made for an unprecedented report – both in Each record contained valuable informa- scope and detail – on badge group telephone tion – contact names, addresses, bank account solicitations. numbers, amounts of money raised and spent, In the process, we analyzed a woefully and the dollars that were actually given to inept system of state regulation and oversight the badge groups. that did little more than shrug its shoulders The best way to deal with this, we decided, at an industry that was costing Coloradans was to database all the information. Once millions of dollars each year. the first year was finished, we delved further And it all started with a call from a back and added three more years worth of solicitor who had a pang of conscience. data. It was all there for the asking. Patterns began to develop before our eyes. 38th Annual Fellowships Competition A financial accounting Addresses matched up among the solicitors, Application deadline: Oct. 1, 2001 The caller made it clear: The organization but company names were different. Bank where he worked was soliciting money for a account numbers matched from one solici- Applications are being accepted from local police fraternity and barely any of the tor to the next, but the badge groups for print journalists with at least five years professional experience. money actually made it there. The solicitors whom the campaigns were occurring were kept nearly all of it. different. One-year grants of $35,000 are awarded It’s not an uncommon story. In fact, an Some solicitors raised money for concerts, to pursue projects of significant interest. essential part of trying to create a unique others for magazines and still others for For information, write: story was to research and read what other benevolent causes. The Alicia Patterson Foundation newspapers across the country had written When we were finished, the total came to 1730 Pennsylvania Ave. NW on the topic. The process took us four weeks about $32 million over a four-year period. Suite 850 to complete and gave us a solid foundation All of it from the public. Washington, DC 20006 on which to build. Next we went back to our research and 202/393-5995 [email protected] Not oddly, the stories were basically the backgrounded every single company and or go to www.aliciapatterson.org same across the country. Solicitors raise solicitor. We checked newspaper stories then click on the link money in the name of public safety, then across the country into the 1980s, lawsuits “Applying for Fellowship” legally keep most of the dough, unbeknownst and criminal records. It was a gold mine. to the contributors. The number of “hits” was astounding. We

14 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES were beginning to see a business fraught with problems, but rarely prosecuted for its indiscretions. Regulating solicitors That’s when we went to the law books again, reading every single case that seemed to affect how the charitable solicitations business ran. We wanted to know how it got to be this way. The answer was scary: The U.S. Constitution protected them. But we still didn’t have the answers we needed. We understood that solicitors across the country often keep most of the money and we understood why. What we didn’t know was what a badge group did with the paltry pennies it received from the company it hired to raise the money. We opened the law books again. The badge groups are non-profits, but they are not 501(c)(3) organizations. They are actually 501(c)(4),(6) and (8). IRS regulations that we found online showed us that every single 501(c) group’s tax records – the famed 990s Y – were public and all we had to do was CEMENT ask them for the last three year’s worth of records. It was the law and they had to A comply. We’d later use their responses to our requests – “What’s the matter, you don’t like cops or something?’’ was one of the gems – ONL as fodder for a fun sidebar. Unfortunately, websites such as www. guidestar.com do not carry 990s from any-

CONTINUED ON PAGE 32 ×

WHEN INVESTIGATING FOR PL NONPROFIT GROUPS, HERE ARE SOME WEBSITES TO CHECK: The Internet Nonprofit Center – www.nonprofits.org GuideStar – www.guidestar.org GrantSmart – www.grantsmart.org The Foundation Center – www.fdncenter.org Earthwatch Institute – www.earthwatch.org American Red Cross – www.crossnet.org

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 15 FEATURES

At that point, we had connected enough dots to know we had a story, but we were EXTENSIVE PUBLIC still a long way from being able to paint a complete picture or even suggest why Gallahue RECORDS SEARCH had orchestrated the loans to someone with as dubious a background as Fraine. To fill in the blanks, we began a sweeping search of LEADS TO PENSION public records to build portraits of Fraine and Gallahue, construct a chronology of events connected to the loans, and assemble a roster FUND FRAUD STORIES of people to interview. In all, we assembled more than 1,000 pages of documents, including: BY JACK MEYERS • zoning board records THE BOSTON HERALD • registry of deeds records from Norfolk County where Fraine also has development projects • building department and sewer department records from communities in which pension ast fall, the Boston Herald published for information leading to his arrest. fund officials reside two series detailing the public transit During the course of an interview, a fringe • court papers filed in four counties involving employees’ pension fund giving $7 figure in Bulger’s organization told a Herald Fraine and his “straws” Lmillion in loans to a notorious arsonist reporter that the aging gangster was old news. • the case file of Fraine’s federal racketeering with longstanding ties to fugitive gangster James “Why don’t you look into why the MBTA conviction for arson in Ohio in 1979 and J. “Whitey” Bulger. By reproducing actual Retirement Fund is giving millions of dollars transcripts of his testimony at the trials of checks and citing invoices, we showed that to Frank Fraine?” the individual said. For the his co-conspirators in a Boston arson ring in the arsonist was providing apparent kickbacks first time in its 50-year history, the source the mid-1970s to the executive director and the chairman of said, the pension fund made direct loans to an • newspaper clippings. the pension fund at the time the loans were individual and the man on the receiving end was These records were helpful in a number of made. a “deadbeat” developer named Fraine. respects. First, our search turned up several When the Herald exposed that Massachu- The source’s tip was meant to steer Herald recent or pending legal actions in which Fraine setts Bay Transportation Authority pension reporters away from writing another Bulger had defaulted on loans, and some of those fund officials had bankrolled a racketeer, the story, but it eventually backfired because the lawsuits provided important details about the attorney general and the U.S. attorney launched Fraine trail led back to Bulger. racketeer. For example, in a community south investigations of their own. The reports also of Boston, one creditor had a pending suit forced the executive director, John J. Gallahue Public records sweep against Fraine alleging he had defaulted on a Jr., to relinquish his post until an internal review Since Gallahue and members of the pension $425,000 loan. In a sworn affidavit in that case, of his private dealings with the felon as well board have a long track record of rebuffing Fraine claimed he made only $26,000 in annual as the circumstances surrounding the loans both formal and informal inquiries, we had to income from a disability pension, had virtually is completed. find an alternative approach. We started with no assets, owned no real estate and had not The stories shone a bright light on a pension real estate records. filed income taxes for 10 years. fund that operates in virtual secrecy and treats In the Suffolk County Registry of Deeds, City building, zoning and assessing records public scrutiny as a threat. Despite the fact which covers Boston, we found a series of also showed that properties listed as collateral that it receives about $30 million per year in MBTA pension fund loans totaling $7 million. for the loans were worth only a fraction of the taxpayers’ money and its members are public The records showed that the collateral for the pension fund’s financial exposure, were for the employees, the pension fund is shielded by a loans was property in South Boston, but the most part undeveloped, and lacked the permits 1993 state supreme court decision which rules identity of the loan recipient was concealed needed to improve them. That combined with the fund is not a public entity and therefore is in a dizzying array of corporations and trusts. Fraine’s history of stiffing lenders made the not subject to ethics, FOIA or public meeting It turned out, however, that Fraine was not as deal an extremely high-risk investment, one laws. careful at the city’s building department. Permit that could only have occurred by breaching the The genesis of the series came from our applications confirmed Fraine’s involvement fund’s ordinary investment procedures. continuing coverage of Bulger and his corrupt with properties the pension fund had bankrolled During our sweep, we discovered that relationships with law enforcement agencies, – with an added bonus. Also signing for one of Gallahue bought a new house in Milton shortly particularly the FBI, which allowed his gang to the permits was a man named Kevin P. O’Neil, after the first loan to Fraine went through. literally get away with murder for two decades. one of Bulger’s top operatives and a man who At about the same time, the chairman of the Bulger is currently on the FBI’s Ten Most had been indicted for racketeering and money pension fund, Edward F. Sheckleton, also sold Wanted list, with a $1 million bounty offered laundering just a few months earlier. his home in Weymouth and bought a newly

16 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES The Boston Herald Boston The

Renee DeKona DeKona Renee

Jack Gallahue, executive director of the MBTA retirement fund, stands near South Station. An investigation found the public transit employees’ pension fund gave $7 million in loans to a notorious arsonist with ties to a fugitive gangster.

built house in Plymouth. We pulled all of the we learned it was arson and that Fraine was mentioned doing some “underground” work building permit, mortgage and deed records we a suspect. As we continued pressing for more for Sheckleton before the pension fund chair- could find, but there were no obvious Fraine information about Fraine, someone who had man sold his Weymouth house. The source fingerprints on the deals. But those records been ignoring our phone calls for weeks did not know what kind of work was done soon came in handy. changed posture – slightly. While refusing to or who had done it, but the tip provided a Digesting the documents provided us with be interviewed, the source provided several key lead to follow. a lot of detailed questions and a large pool of documents showing that Fraine made $100,000 Reviewing our files, we found that Sheck- potential sources to pose them to, including in payments to Gallahue’s girlfriend just before leton’s house had been using a septic system. creditors, subcontractors, co-defendants, build- and immediately after Fraine received his first However, because of a state law passed in the ing inspectors and business partners. We started loan from the pension fund. mid-1990s, the home had to be connected to churning these prospective sources, most of the municipal sewer system before it could be whom either refused to return our phone calls Underground work sold. Town files showed the sewer connection or answer any of our questions. However, Our first two-part series, published last was put in two weeks before the sale, but did a few cooperated, often by giving us vague September, triggered investigations by the not list who performed the work. A visit to “guidance” or by elaborating on something in attorney general and the FBI, and, as the Sheckleton’s neighbors paid off handsomely. a public record. saying goes, it stirred the pot. Fraine, Gallahue We got the names of both contractors – one At that stage of an investigation, even a little and their associates began talking amongst was Gallahue’s former brother-in-law and the information has a tendency to snowball. One themselves, widening the circle of people who other was a frequent Fraine subcontractor. To source mentioned that a building associated with were privy to the details of their private deals, top it off, one neighbor identified Fraine as Fraine had been damaged in a suspicious fire some of whom were also talking to us. the supervisor of the job.

a few months earlier. Checking with officials, In one instance, a source told us that Fraine CONTINUED ON PAGE 30 ×

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 17 very newsroom gets them. LettersLetters C O V E R S T O R Y or phone calls from inmates or or their families detailing stories of abuse and neglect and injustice on the inside. But these stories often are ignored by journalists for a variety of reasons. Still, investigations into these allegations often turn up compelling stories that expose wrongdoings from both sides of the prison walls.

BY MARY ZAHN BY KATHLEEN JOHNSTON OF THE MILWAUKEE AND GERRY LANOSGA JOURNAL SENTINEL OF WTHR-TV, INDIANAPOLIS t started with a here probably isn’t a news- phone call from a room in the country that weeping woman. She doesn’t regularly receive pleas said a female inmate from prison inmates to look into at Taycheedah Cor- their cases or to investigate a rectional Institution prison. in Fond du Lac, Wis., But for a variety of reasons had died a horrible – including a lack of merit or death. veracity – those pleas often fall Please help, she pleaded before hanging up on deaf ears. If you work for a television station, without identifying herself. as we do, it’s even harder to interest your news I quickly filed an open records request for director in stories about prisons or prisoners. the inmate’s name and details of her death with Prison stories are easy to ignore because many both the Fond du Lac Police Department and of us (reflecting the sentiments of the public at the state Department of Corrections. When they large) simply don’t care what happens behind balked at releasing the clearly public records, I prison walls. But last year we found a story that 18 knew this case was special. showed it’s worth checking out those pleas TandHE IRE JOURNAL CONTINUED ON PAGE 20 CONTINUED ON PAGE 22 C O V E R S T O R Y BY DIANE JENNINGS OF THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS n a state as big as Texas – 20 mil- lion people and 254 counties – any story examining a statewide issue is challenging. But studying the issue of indigent defense, which The Dallas Morn- ing News did, proved particularly daunting, requiring a combination of old-fashioned pen- and-paper reporting skills and contemporary computer savvy. BY BILL SIZEMORE The results were significant: After three OF THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT months of plowing through dusty files and hen I approached databases, the paper found that about one in my editors in 1999 four death row inmates had been defended with a proposal for an by lawyers who were reprimanded, placed on investigative project probation, suspended or banned from practicing on the prison boom in law by the State Bar of Texas. Virginia, I was rely- CONTINUED ON PAGE 26 ing to some degree on a hunch. But it turned out to be a pretty safe one. I had read national accounts of the growing American penchant for locking people up, and I guessed that Virginia was at the forefront. I remembered that George Allen, now a U.S. senator, had been elected governor in 1993 largely on the strength of a get-tough-on-crime platform that called for lengthening sentences, abolishing parole and building more prisons. BY ALAN PRENDERGAST And Allen delivered. He did everything OF WESTWORD he promised, launching a new wave of prison rite one or two building that diverted hundreds of millions of articles about taxpayer dollars from other state needs such prison conditions in as education and transportation. your state, and soon What I didn’t realize until I started crunch- you’ll be deluged with ing the numbers of this data-driven story was letters from inmates that Allen sold his get-tough program on a begging you to inves- false premise. tigate their complaints. Mixed in with the usual CONTINUED ON PAGE 24 laments about bad food, atrocious health care, and brutal or corrupt guards will be stories that seem too outrageous to be true, yet too compelling to pass up. Having covered corrections for the Denver weekly Westword for the past six years, writing roughly 150,000 words on the subject, I’ve never lacked story ideas; one tip leads to another and another. The problem is separating fact from fiction, particularly when prison authorities put up roadblocks. CONTINUED ON PAGE 28

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 19 C O V E R S T O R Y

The details were horrifying. effect, we used the prison system’s own Prison health Michelle Greer, 29, died within hours records to build our case. of pleading repeatedly with corrections We found one inmate after another who from page 18 officers for help with an acute asthma attack had died from a treatable illness, but were Feb. 2, 2000. She collapsed on the floor ignored until it was too late. Their cases were of a dining hall, where she died gasping quietly closed, their bodies buried without for breath, still clutching her inhaler. She any real investigation. had told corrections officers multiple times The case of Angel Duran – who com- that the inhaler was not helping her condi- plained for more than two days of severe tion. Corrections officers had contacted abdominal pain – was typical. Taycheedah health services twice on her Duran had come to America from Cuba behalf and were told by nurses that the in 1979 and spoke broken English. situation was not an emergency because By the time he was taken to the hospital Greer could still talk. he was hyperventilating, semi-conscious and grimacing in pain. Nurses didn’t believe Inmates ignored Duran was ill and believed he was just By the time the Journal Sentinel ran anxious over his impending deportation. the first story on Feb. 15, 2000, the Fond He died from a ruptured appendix. du Lac Police Department had ended its The four-paragraph Dodge County Sher- investigation into the death without referring iff’s Department report stated that prison the matter to the district attorney’s office authorities notified them than an inmate was for review and the Taycheedah security sent to the hospital with “apparent” chest director had written a report concluding pains, that the inmate had died and that that “response by Taycheedah staff was the coroner said there were “no suspicious exemplary.” circumstances.” That case turned out to be just the tip The case was then closed without a refer- of the iceberg. ral to the district attorney’s office. After the story ran, other sources from within and without the state prison system Deaths written off began to call. Look further, they said, this is One of the most challenging parts of the not an isolated incident. Other inmates have project was locating inmate families so they died horrible deaths. could sign releases allowing us to get the I knew there had been more than 100 medical records of their loved ones. inmate deaths in the past six years because of That was no easy feat. a state prison computerized database I pur- We started with a list of names as common chase annually. George as Larry Tyson and William Brown. We did Stanley, our managing not even know their places of residence editor, agreed we needed before they went to prison. The Department to look at each and every of Corrections refused to give us any reports one of them to determine on their deaths, medical or otherwise, without whether Greer’s situation blackouts unless we had releases from their was an isolated incident next of kin. or a pattern. To find them we looked through court Because of the enor- records, police records and coroner records. mous amount of work We used an Internet service called Auto- involved, Stanley assigned track. We called funeral homes. We knocked Jessica McBride to work on doors. We got one release from a jail full-time with me on the inmate. project. We quickly learned that in many of the For eight months we cases no records existed outside the prison fought for every shred of system about the inmate deaths. No coroner evidence we could find, carefully keeping records, no police reports. It appeared that a log of all the details and footnoting every unless an inmate had died of a homicide, fact. We had decided early on that we would nobody paid attention and wrote it off as not use any inmate stories unless they were natural. backed up by the prison medical data. In In one county, the coroner reports were

20 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Journal Milwaukee The

Erwin Gebhard Gebhard Erwin

In his office in Juneau, Dodge County Coroner John Omen looks up records on prison deaths. Law enforcement officials rarely review prisoner deaths, and the coroner’s records provide few or no details about what might have happened to inmates.

either missing or were scribblings on pieces prison health care that they allowed us to better training and more health care staff. of paper. They were literally stuffed into a quote them by name. A legislative audit released earlier this year filing cabinet in random order. The coroner In the meantime, some peculiar things confirmed our findings. initially refused to open his files at all, in happened. One inmate got transferred to Our advice to reporters considering a violation of Wisconsin’s Open Records law. an out-of-state prison on the morning of similar investigation is to persevere and force But we persisted. our scheduled interview with him. And government officials to conform to open The corrections department also tried someone had called the Journal Sentinel’s records laws. Build a case through records to block us in many ways. We were told long-distance carrier to put a block on my and take the time to do it right. State prison we could not see mortality review reports office number so that any calls initiating system officials thought that by putting up – internal prison documents on deaths – from inmates in the state prison system enough roadblocks we would just go away. even with releases. After many months of would no longer be connected. They were wrong. haggling with our lawyers, in the end they No one in our company had made the did provide the reports. But many were scant request and prison system authorities denied Mary Zahn and Jessica McBride were recently and cursory. any knowledge of the situation. The phone awarded the 2001 Clark Mollenhoff Award We also had sources within the prison company didn’t know who had called. for Excellence in Investigative Reporting for system who pointed us to egregious cases After our three-part series was published these stories. Zahn is a project reporter with of poor health care and helped us focus our last October, prison officials were forced expertise in investigations involving public policy issues. McBride is a general assignment research. All but two requested we protect to admit reforms were needed. New prison reporter with expertise in law enforcement. The legislation was proposed, including an their identities. A corrections officer and series can be found at www.jsonline.com/news/ a prison nurse felt so strongly about poor outside panel to review inmate deaths, state/oct00/apriz22102100.asp.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 21 C O V E R S T O R Y

deserve a closer look, and Kathy White’s tip eventually led to uncovering more problems inside the prison, including some 20 stories about trafficking of illegal goods (by both inmates and prison staff), extortion, assaults, and increased costs associated with what seemed to be futile efforts to enforce Indiana’s prison tobacco ban. Pattern of problems Our first series of stories, which aired last August, documented a trail of intimidation and payoffs at Westville – stemming mainly from trafficking in tobacco, which became a hot commodity among both inmates and employees when it was banned in 1997. Inmates weren’t the only ones involved; we also found numerous cases of involvement by prison employees such as nurses and guards. Given the number, the logical question was, is the ban working? We answered the question in a second two-part series in February that, Department of Correction employee Nancy Spiegla confirmed claims of extortion and the involvement of corrections employees at Westville Prison. for the first time, tallied the high costs of the ban. The numbers were stunning: 412 internal that sometimes, what happens behind the investigations, 44 staffers fired, and at least EXTORTION walls clearly affects those on the outside. 375 years of extra prison time for inmates A source called about a woman desperate who violated the ban – quite simply, millions from page 18 to get someone to listen to what was happen- of taxpayer dollars up in smoke. ing to her son at a northern Indiana medium- And while the Department of Correction security prison, Westville Correctional Facil- downplayed the extent of tobacco-related ity. Kathy White’s story was compelling. problems, we were able to show – using the Her son had been sentenced to 15 years for department’s own documents – that the ban using a gun to steal a pair of tennis shoes has been a costly policy, spawning numerous when he was a teenager. Thrown in among violent incidents, internal investigations adult inmates at Westville, he would call her, and disciplinary actions. The DOC disputed crying, to say he would be our numbers, of course, arguing that they beaten if she didn’t send were responding quickly to allegations of money orders to certain wrongdoing and that the ban was saving addresses in Indiana and money on healthcare costs. But to this day, around the country. Her despite repeated requests from WTHR and story led us to numerous legislators, the department has not provided other inmates’ families any of its own numbers to prove its case. with similar claims. One As with any investigative project, this inmate was seriously story presented a number of unique obstacles. burned in the prison’s Naturally, the veracity of inmates’ stories industrial-sized dish- was a major concern. Complicating matters washer. Other families was the fact that the DOC refused to let reported severe beatings us interview any of the inmates, saying of their loved ones. every one we named was part of an internal Violence and intimi- investigation into allegations of wrongdoing. dation behind bars, of (Several inmates later told us no one from course, is not uncommon. But here was DOC ever questioned them). a prison story with an interesting twist – Still, we were able to confirm our story by innocent family members outside of Westville following a trail of documents and interviews being extorted by inmates in exchange for that clearly showed a widespread pattern their loved ones’ safety inside. It seemed to of problems at Westville. We interviewed

22 THE IRE JOURNAL dozens of former inmates, inmates’ families FROM THE RESOURCE CENTER and attorneys, prison employees, prison rights activists, prison ministers and state The IRE Resource Center has more • Poughkeepsie Journal docu- government sources. One particular coup was than 200 stories that deal with pris- mented the role of the 1970s-era persuading a correctional officer of the year ons and jails. Here are a few notable drug laws in the huge growth of at Westville to do an on-camera interview. stories available for review: prisons in New York State, and its She substantiated claims of extortion and questionable results: the incar- the involvement of correctional employees, • Austin American-Statesman found ceration of thousands of low- saying many of them weren’t subject to that gangs aligned by race and level offenders who are almost routine searches. We confirmed her account ethnicity were thriving inside with a key internal document stating that exclusively black or Hispanic. The Texas prisons, despite authori- series further found that sen- employees were exempt from searches as ties’ efforts to stop them. In some long as they drove to work in their state- tencing and parole trends have owned cars. instances, prison guards enlisted kept prisons full in the 1990s Records were crucial to our stories. Many gang leaders in their efforts to despite a huge drop in crime, family members, including White, had copies maintain order. And gangs’ power questioning whether the eco- of documents, such as Western Union wire extends beyond prison walls, as nomic and political muscle of the transactions, to back up their claims. Fol- they operate illegal drug rings in prison lobby had begun to influ- lowing that money helped us authenticate cities and battle one another to ence sentence policy. By Mary the extortion allegations. Official records expand their influence. By Mike Beth Pfeiffer and Carol Trapani, were also important. DOC disciplinary and Ward, 1998, #15410. administrative reports (obtained through 2000, #17265 the state’s open records laws) and internal • KENS-TV, San Antonio, investi- • ABC News 20/20 spent two DOC documents (obtained through sources) gated the unusually high number weeks inside a prison that houses gave convincing evidence that inmates were of people diagnosed with neuro- about 800 juveniles, aged 13-18, receiving help from employees. In fact, muscular diseases in Huntsville, then-DOC Commissioner Ed Cohn candidly to see what happens when chil- Texas, decades after the U.S. gov- admitted some of his own employees were dren are put in prisons. By ernment performed a secret germ “one breath away from being an inmate.” Robbie Gordon, Sarah Walker, warfare experiment on inmates at Diane Sawyer, Joe Bridgers, Mike the Huntsville prison in the 1970s. System crackdown Hardee and Rick Pullem, 1998, There have been many developments since There is evidence that the inca- #15337. our stories aired. Several legislators have pacitating agents spread from called for a review of the prison system – inmates to prison guards, criminal • WXYZ-TV, Detroit, reports that particularly Westville – and the tobacco justice system employees and ban. Two Indiana judges refused to return prisoners in Wayne County, Mich., their families. By Kenneth Huizar, walk free from the local jails inmates to Westville and one judge urged the 2000, #17457. governor to conduct an independent review. nearly every day as a result of The ACLU’s national prison rights project is • The Connecticut Department overcrowding. Through the state completing an audit of Westville. A number of Corrections yields hundreds Freedom of Information Act, the of prison officials have been reassigned of “escapes” from the halfway investigative unit obtained data (although DOC generally insists the changes on thousands of prisoners who are routine). And the state has stepped up its houses and community home release programs where many had been let go in 1999. They own efforts to root out trafficking offenses found that the county broke its in its prisons: A hidden-camera sting opera- prisoners go near the end of their tion earlier this year netted 18 inmates and sentences. Escaping is little more own rule by releasing violent employees smoking and trafficking. than walking away or failing to criminals, and that many pris- Results like that clearly show the impor- report to the officer assigned oners were serving only a frac- tance of listening to the small cries for help to monitor them. The Hartford tion of their sentences. Jim that come every day into our newsrooms. Courant investigated these pro- Schaefer and Shellee Smith, grams after convict Adrian Peeler 1999, #16263. Kathleen Johnston and Gerry Lanosga, formerly walked away from a halfway of the Indianapolis News and Indianapolis Star, To order copies of these stories or are investigative producers at WTHR, the NBC house and murdered two people affiliate in Indianapolis. nine months later. By Jack Dolan others that are available, call the IRE and Dave Altimari, 1999, #15864. Resource Center at 573-882-3364.

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Bill Tiernan The Virginian-Pilot His television commercials – punctuated by gunfire and wailing ambulances – pounded home the theme that the state was in the grip of a violent crime wave. But the numbers showed otherwise. As measured by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program, crime in Virginia in 1993 – already low by national standards – was on the decline. Comparing Virginia’s crime rate to its incarceration rate, as recorded by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, helped illustrate the state’s punitive mindset. Virginia’s crime rate ranked 36th among the 50 states, but its incarceration rate was the 19th highest – a gap that exists in few other states. Even so, the state couldn’t find enough lawbreaking Virginians to fill all the new cells it was building. By 1999, Virginia had nearly Virginia inmate Joe Garrett is serving 52 years on 4,500 excess prison beds and was trying to marijuana and LSD conspiracy charges, one of the recoup its costs by importing out-of-state nonviolent criminal offenders packing the state’s prisons. Here he is shown with his wife and one of prisoners in a cells-for-hire program that was his three children. unique in the nation. not in Virginia. After lengthy negotiations, the Questionable value department denied my request, employing a I was also able to show, using the state broad disclosure exemption under the state Department of Corrections’ own numbers, Freedom of Information Act. that while the politicians harped on violent Besides complicating the number-crunching Cell block C at the Powhatan Correctional Center in Powhatan County, Va. crime: job, that setback deprived me of easy access to • Most of the new inmates coming into the inmates – the human faces I needed to bring the system were nonviolent offenders – especially story home to readers. So I had to use a more CONSTRUCTION drug offenders. laborious route to find them. from page 19 [Using drug-use numbers produced by I knew from the numbers that the prisons the U.S. Department of Health and Human were packed with nonviolent drug offenders. Services’ National Household Survey on Drug But how to identify them? I needed names. Abuse, I was able to show that Virginia’s large-scale incarceration of drug offenders Inmate interviews – despite research indicating that treatment I started contacting every advocacy group is cheaper and more effective – had failed to I could find – prison reform organizations, reduce drug use.] inmate support groups, drug-law reform lobbies. • Black Virginians were being imprisoned Gradually, names started trickling in. But I hit on drug charges in numbers vastly out of a mother lode with the November Coalition, proportion to their use of illegal drugs. a drug-law reform group that keeps a national • Virginia’s lengthened sentences and aboli- database of drug prisoners. They were able tion of parole are creating a growing population to slice out and send me a list of those doing of geriatric prisoners whose confinement is time in Virginia. costly and of questionable crime-prevention At the same time, I culled some names value. from a sentencing database the newspaper Many of the numbers I used in this project had purchased from the state Supreme Court. came from sources other than the state Depart- Compiling a master list, I drafted a form ment of Corrections, which was singularly letter and mass-mailed it to prisoners. Many unhelpful. responded, and agreed to be interviewed. This I attempted to obtain the department’s provided the humanity to the story I needed. inmate database – a detailed snapshot of the That human touch was further bolstered by inmate population including names, gender, family photographs of prisoners with their race, offenses and sentences. In some states, spouses, siblings and children. (The state at the these databases are now available online. But time didn’t allow cameras in the prisons.)

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Crime drops as spending and prisoners increase Spending on corrections has increased almost twice as fast as state aid to higher Virginia’s crime rate ranks 36th among the 50 states. But its rate of imprisonment education in the past two decades. If the trend continues, Virginia’s prison spending is the 19th highest. Virginians are imprisoned at a rate nearly as high as Russia’s, will soon hit $1 billion a year. the highest in the world.

Prisons vs. education: This year’s spending levels are $846 million for corrections and $1.3 billion for higher education. Source: Senate Finance Committee. The Virginia inmate population has jumped 237 percent in the past 20 years. To fill 4,000 beds that remained empty, the state has been importing criminals since 1998.

The gap between Virginia’s violent crime rate and the nation’s average is more extreme than that for the overall crime rate. The violent crime rate includes murder/non- negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault. The overall crime rate adds burglary, larceny, motor vehicle theft. Sources: FBI, Virginia State The inmate escalation: Officials predict that the surplus of cells will fill up with Virginia Police. inmates in a few years. (Sources: Senate Finance Committee, Secretary of Public Safety. )

Pursuing leads that emerged during this project, I subsequently reported on allegations of abuse by guards at the state’s two new super maximum-security prisons, where many nonviolent and out-of-state inmates have been housed in cells ostensibly designed for the “worst of the worst” – violent, disruptive, escape-prone prisoners. Those allegations have prompted a civil rights investigation by the Justice Department and a lawsuit by the ACLU. I also did a follow-up story on pervasive drug trafficking inside prison walls – with guards sometimes supplying the drugs. Since the prison boom is a national phe- nomenon, I suspect projects like this one could be done in many other states. My suggestion: Start with the national data and see where your state’s incarceration rate ranks. If it’s relatively high, you’ve probably got a story.

Bill Sizemore is an investigative reporter at The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk. “The High Cost of Hard Time,” is online at www.pilotonline.com/ special/prisons.

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In about half of these instances, the Death row misconduct occurred before the attorney Some helpful sources was appointed to handle the capital case. for prison investigations: from page 19 The infractions included problems such • U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics as failing to appear in court, falsifying documents, failing to present key witnesses (www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs): The Justice and allowing clients to lie. Department’s statistical arm. Compiles The Morning News also learned that in incarceration rates. one county, the judge had the prosecutor’s • FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program office handle court appointments of defense (www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm): Compiles attorneys, effectively allowing the district crime rates. attorney to choose his opponent. As the story was going to press, the judge promptly • The Sentencing Project resigned. (www.sentencingproject.org): Criminal jus- Further, using a Dallas County payment tice think tank that promotes alternatives database, we learned that the local lawyer to incarceration. who has been paid the most out of the county’s indigent defense fund was not • The Corrections Yearbook representing poor people charged with (www.cji-inc.com): Annual compilation of crimes. Instead, judges were paying him data on jails, prisons and the incarcerated almost $250,000 a year out of the fund population. to answer mail they received from prison inmates and to handle routine legal writs • Substance Abuse and Mental Health Ser- – tasks performed by secretaries and legal vices Administration (www.samhsa.gov): assistants in other counties. Publishes annual National Household After the story appeared, under pressure Survey on Drug Abuse. from the county commissioners, the judges abandoned this practice. • The November Coalition (www.november.org): Drug-law reform Sleeping lawyers group that keeps a national database of Researching the use of court-appointed drug prisoners. attorneys was particularly difficult for the very reason the paper decided to pursue the story – there is no statewide system or in jail for months before being provided an standards for appointing lawyers for the attorney, reporter Brooks Egerton worked poor, making it difficult the phone, querying source after source, to know how well such before hitting the road. He found three appointments actually examples in three different parts of the state. work. Each judge has His story about Felipe Rodriguez, a young used his own method of retarded man who had been locked up for deciding not only the months on arson charges without even a attorneys qualified to visit from his court-appointed attorney led handle appointments, to dismissal of the charges and Rodriguez’ but also when they release from jail. are appointed and how The quality of attorneys appointed in much they are paid. capital cases has been an issue in Texas for In other words, there years, because of several highly publicized are more than 800 sys- trials in which lawyers dozed off or put forth tems, because that’s how little effort on behalf of their clients. many judges preside in The Morning News wanted more than Texas. anecdotal evidence, so we decided to find out To tackle the issue, a team of reporters exactly how good or how bad the representa- divided the subject into three parts: timeliness tion is by compiling a list of attorneys who of appointment; death penalty representation; had represented each of the 461 inmates on and appointment methods. death row at that time, and checking their To find examples of defendants who sat disciplinary record.

26 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

The inmate names were taken from the The next morning, the association’s Texas Department of Criminal Justice Web legal counsel e-mailed him a copy of the TIPSHEETS AND REPORTING GUIDES site and put into an Access database. The database. If you’re looking into prisons and jails, paper’s library staff used those names to Now we had to integrate it into our try these tipsheets available from the search legal databases for published judicial database. This required considerable data IRE Resource Center, (www.ire.org/ decisions. A reporter read each of those cleaning and manipulation. One database, resourcecenter): decisions, searching for names of lawyers for instance, filed the information by last who represented the inmates at trial or on names first; the other by first names first. · “Behind the Bars: Getting Inside America’s appeal. Using our new integrated database, we Booming Prison Industry,” #844. This Librarians then used a database to search identified the death row attorneys with 36-page packet from a 1998 IRE National for clips mentioning attorney names. Next, disciplinary histories. Then we used some Conference panel on prisons includes research librarian Darlean Spangenberger traditional investigative techniques. Reporter the “Prison Resource List,” which has journeyed to the Texas Court of Criminal Dan Malone requested from the association almost 50 Web sites and phone numbers Appeals in Austin, to search original files for the detailed disciplinary files on each attor- those cases where little or no information ney. These were divvied up among several for resources on jails and prisons. Also had been found. reporters who read them and prepared short included is “The Prison Crisis,” by Jenni Spangenberger spent two days plowing summaries for their colleagues. Gainsboro and Elizabeth Alexander of through massive case files. Sometimes the After reviewing hundreds of cases, the ACLU’s National Prison Project. It details appointment information was easily found paper published an overview of our findings, the growth of the U.S. prison population, on the docket sheet, sometimes attorney thumbnail sketches of a half-dozen cases worsening conditions of confinement, names were listed on the jury verdict sheet. with questionable representation, and in- public health problems in prisons, and In some cases she skimmed voluminous depth stories about two specific cases that more restricted access to the courts for documents looking for the information. dramatically illustrated the flaws in the inmates. Using her laptop, she entered the informa- system. Also in the packet is “Access to Prisons,” tion she collected into a copy of our develop- Along the way, we found one oddity in ing database. Still, we had many holes to fill. the database, resulting in a surprising story. by Charles N. Davis, Society of Professional Reporters and library researchers turned to A lawyer was listed as having a probationary Journalists, May 1998. This study tracks the phone, calling county clerks and cajoling license – the bar association had given him prison access policies for journalists. them into ferreting out old case files, or a temporary license because of its concerns Includes state-by-state breakdown. contacting appellate attorneys to get the about his unpaid debts. · “Breaking Through the Walls: Some Sources names of the trial attorneys on the cases Despite his probationary status and and Tips for Reporting on Prisons,” by James they were now handling. inexperience, the lawyer had been assigned to handle an appeal for a death row inmate. Grimaldi, Orange County Register, #6. Flawed system When Slover pulled the court records from · “Investigating Injustices in Immigration Initially, we began checking each attorney the case he discovered that this lawyer Law,” by Lise Olson, Seattle Post-Intelli- name we entered into the database against the had asked the court for an extension to gencer, #1437. Contains a list of sources state bar association’s reports on disciplinary file his brief because he needed to take for stories related to immigrants held in status, which were on the association’s an introductory course in death penalty Web site. By now, reporter Pete Slover defense. prisons and jails on behalf of the Immigra- was involved in the project. Realizing that The court granted the extension, but tion and Naturalization Service. the information on the Web site had to be the lawyer missed that deadline, too – and · “Tips for Your First Large-Scale Criminal powered by some sort of database, he called only filed his brief after the appeals court Justice CAR Project,” James Walsh, Star- the association’s computer folks (he’d dealt threatened to jail him for contempt. And on Tribune, #1335. From the 2000 NICAR with them on an earlier, unrelated project) the day of oral arguments, the lawyer was conference panel, “Unlock the secrets and got the technical information. And a no show. But the justices left him on the he requested a copy of the database from case and denied the appeal. of the prison industry: Unsupervised the association’s public records custodian. The lawyer later lost his license after releases, importing inmates and ethnic Around this time, the “disciplinary status” bouncing checks for state bar dues and disparity.” line suddenly vanished from the Web site. occupational taxes and failing to appear at a · “Parole: The Easy Out…And an Easy Project The association told us that the informa- board hearing to defend himself. for Anyone to Do,” Mark Braykovich, The tion should never have been there and that it was not going to give us a copy of the Diane Jennings is a reporter for The Dallas Cincinnati Enquirer, #435. Explains ways database. Slover, who is a lawyer, pressed the Morning News. Project reporters included newspapers can use CAR to find how their issue by submitting a formal written request Dan Malone, Steve McGonigle, Pete Slover, state parole systems are working. Brooks Egerton and research librarian Darlean and citing examples from his extensive past Spangenberger. It was edited by Pam Maples, experience with open records fights. AME/Projects.

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Last year I received a letter from Danny Weeks, to the inmates being provided with special tools Snitch unit a convicted kidnapper serving a life sentence at for the purpose of making weapons. According to the U.S. Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Weeks, the unit made “instructional” videos for from page 19 in Florence, Colo., better known as ADX – home staff, showing how inmates craft weapons, procure of some of the most dangerous criminals in the drugs, and compromise staffers. Eventually, I was federal system. Weeks claimed to have been part able to talk to staffers who’d seen those videos – of a special snitch unit set up within ADX, a group and were appalled at scenes of masked prisoners, of former Aryan Brotherhood gang members armed with real knives, simulating attacks on turned government informants, who’d been given other inmates. special privileges, access to sensitive information Through his attorney, Weeks was able to about staff and ongoing criminal investigations, provide other documents that helped to shore up and even materials to make weapons. The letter his credibility, including his government contract posed a peculiar challenge: How do you verify the to serve as an informant. In addition, Weeks had existence of a top-secret government operation in filed a grievance seeking payment for his work the highest-security prison in the country? in the videos; a prison administrator denied his I think it’s fair to say that U.S. Bureau of request but acknowledged his participation in the Prison officials were less than enthusiastic about project. The most damning materials, though, my research. ADX Warden Michael Pugh denied surfaced in a federal lawsuit Weeks and another my request to visit Weeks on the grounds that an prisoner had filed after their ouster from the interview “could cause undue unrest or disturb the unit. One exhibit featured a long list of names of good order of the institution.” His refusal resulted international drug-trafficking suspects culled from in a time-consuming (and closely monitored) cor- a confidential DEA file that Weeks’ handlers had respondence with my source, who’d been moved asked him to analyze. If Weeks was able to move out of the snitch unit and placed in isolation. My such materials out of ADX with ease, what other FOIA requests to Washington didn’t receive even sensitive information had leaked out of the snitch the courtesy of a denial; contrary to the law, they unit? Was the government debriefing the gang were simply ignored. leaders, or was it the other way around? Privileged residents A sore spot But official channels aren’t the only way to Another piece of the puzzle was provided by a get at a prison story. Prisoners have a tremendous former ADX guard who’d been placed on “home grapevine, and so do their keepers. Inmates and duty” for months, largely as a result of the snitch corrections officers seldom agree about anything, unit’s accusations of corruption. No criminal but rumors about the snitch unit had stirred charges ever resulted from the unit’s allegations; concern among ADX staffers, whose union was according to Weeks, his fellow inmates were already embroiled in several disputes with prison scamming their handlers and making up stories management. Grumblings about staffers they didn’t like. The ex-guard, about the prison’s “special” who’d been jailed on unrelated charges, was eager inmates had surfaced on the to talk about his ordeal and that of other guards union Web site’s bulletin who fell under suspicion. board. By poking through Initially loathe to comment, Warden Pugh documents filed by the union finally decided to respond to Weeks’ disclosures in Federal Labor Relations after they sparked an internal BOP investigation. Authority actions and check- He denied several of the most disturbing allegations ing with sources I’d devel- about H Unit, but even his denials were revealing. oped through earlier report- While insisting that no supermax prisoner was ever ing on the union, I was able allowed access to the Internet, as Weeks claimed, to find employees who could he did admit that H Unit had been provided with a corroborate certain aspects computer – an amazing concession in a lockdown of Weeks’ story – for exam- facility where even use of a typewriter is strictly ple, officers who’d seen bags controlled. of burgers, barbecue, pizza The lesson here is an old one: When the front and other “delicacies” from town being delivered door is barred, try the back stairs, the cellar door, to the privileged residents of H Unit. and the grapevine. Guards’ unions, grievance But few officers had actually been inside H forms, court records, ex-employees, even official Unit. I obtained internal BOP memos that made denials can provide valuable information about reference to debriefing sessions in the unit and life on the inside.

28 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

PRISON STORY IDEAS If you’re looking for some ideas to get you started on prison-related stories, consider these excerpts from the judicial system chapter of “The Reporter’s Handbook,” an IRE publication: • Wardens. How did they enter the prison • Inmate families. Not all prison sto- bureaucracy? How did they receive ries involve persons behind bars. their appointment to the current job? For prisoners with families on the Have they articulated their philosophies outside, do programs exist encour- about rehabilitation and punishment? aging everybody to remain a unit Are their actions consistent with their during the incarceration? When philosophies? spouses, children and other rela- tives visit, is there a private area • Guards. Do the minimum qualifications to promote a constructive after- make sense, and are they adhered to? Is noon? the pay adequate to attract intelligent, Also, you can get an overview nonviolent applicants for such danger- of federal institutions by studying ous jobs? In many states, prison guards publications from the Federal Inmate Danny Weeks was part of a snitch unit given are unionized, which means journalists special privileges, access to sensitive information Bureau of Prisons, www.bop.gov, about staff and ongoing criminal investigations, and can obtain information from union part of the U.S. Department of even the materials needed to make weapons. officials before talking with individual Justice. Like other agencies, the The resulting article, “A Broken Code,” guards. bureau issues an annual report appeared in July of last year (www.westword.com/ and a personnel directory. The fed- prison). A few days later, Warden Pugh announced • Prisoners. Are they being treated in eral prison system categorizes its to his staff that Weeks had failed a polygraph test. accordance with their constitutional Yet the story Weeks told me had been substantially rights? To find out, examine prison com- facilities according to the types corroborated by other sources. Although the BOP’s plaint files, interview recently released of prisoners incarcerated there – own investigation into H Unit led nowhere, the prisoners, plus check lawsuits filed by penitentiaries, correctional institu- unit’s population was substantially reshuffled; the tions, prison camps, detention cen- snitch operation appears to have been abandoned, prisoners in federal and state courts. ters, medical and administrative or at least revised. In many such lawsuits, the plaintiffs The article was widely distributed among represent themselves (“pro se” is the facilities. prison staff and discussed at length on the union legal term), using law books in the prison State prison agencies do not Web site. The snitch unit was one of the sore library for reference. usually oversee such variety, but points raised during an unusual “informational do usually produce publications, picket” of the Florence prison complex by guards • Rehabilitation. Inquire about in-prison annual reports and directories sim- last fall. Ironically, few ADX prisoners have ever educational programs, including those ilar to the federal system. The state seen the article. Warden Pugh has banned it from the prison on the grounds that it “may facilitate that could lead to a high-school diploma agencies adopt some suggestions criminal activity.” or a college degree; facilities for physi- from the National Institute of Cor- Specifically, the article refers to the videos cal conditioning; spiritual guidance rections, a federal agency think the H Unit regulars made for the BOP to show no matter the choice of religion; psy- tank. how inmates can fashion weapons out of ordinary chological counseling for habitual sex The National Prison Project, part commissary items. This is information many inmates already have, information so vital that the offenders; treatment to alleviate drug of the American Civil Liberties warden wanted to make sure his staff knew about addictions and control alcoholism; and Union Foundation in Washington, it. But the BOP never figured it would appear vocational training, including help with D.C., is a private organization inter- in a newspaper. job placement. If programs are operat- ested in individual prisoners’ rights Alan Prendergast is a staff writer for Westword and ing, what follow-up do prison officials and overall conditions, while the teaches journalism at Colorado College. He recently practice after release to determine American Correctional Association, worked for CBS News on a one-hour documentary about the Columbine shootings that aired on 60 whether the former convict has gone in Laurel, Md., speaks for prison Minutes II. straight? administrators and staff.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 29 FEATURES PANELS

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 6 Pension

• Medical Data Maze: Mortality, disease and • Home-Grown Databases: Advice and cau- CONTINUED FROM PAGE 17 research tion on building your own As for Gallahue’s new home, sources identi- • Economy: Looking for data-based stories GETTING INFO ONLINE fied the architect and contractors listed in build- during a downturn • Business Info Online ing department files as Fraine’s subcontractors. • Economy: Describing a community’s • Finding People with Online Databases A site visit showed those contractors were in the midst of a basement-to-roof renovation of health • Bang for the Buck: Evaluating online Gallahue’s house. • Using Government Data Locally: Labor databases stats, census economics, county business At that point, the source who had provided patterns MAPPING the earlier documents showing Fraine’s pay- ments to Gallahue’s girlfriend stepped up • Evaluating Companies: Understanding • Mapping Overview: Basics demo using to the plate again. He gave us invoices and what makes them tick census data • Mapping on a Budget other business records showing that Fraine’s CENSUS PANELS company was actually paying for work at • Census Post Mortem: First round of releases PEER REVIEWS Gallahue’s house. We were able to quote dates • What Census Says to the Demographers • Cutting-Edge CAR: What Florida taught and amounts of checks, the text of invoices and other documents clearly linking Fraine • Mapping Census: Layering census with us to the extensive renovations on Gallahue’s other data • What Social Scientists Can Teach Us home. At that point, we were ready to write our • Census Spinning: Stakehold- WORKSHOPS second two-part series, published in December, ers and what spin they want • Online and CAR Geeks: Strate- documenting apparent serious criminal conduct • Race, Ethnicity and the gies for working together by pension fund officials with hard evidence. Census • Putting Maps Online: Software One technique we found useful in reporting • Census Surveys: American basics, making it happen the story was to “digest” the sprawling pile of Community Survey, CPS, SIPP • CAR Training in the Newsroom documents we assembled, meaning we wrote and PUMS and the Classroom: Can you summaries of the documents. For instance, for each property, we wrote a history of its • Mining Census Data for Non- afford not to? ownership going back 20 to 30 years and wove Census Stories • CAR in Small to Medium News- into that information from building department WRITING/GRAPHICS rooms: Doing and teaching and zoning board records. By doing that, • Stats in Stories • Mapping on the Cutting we became conversant with all the details of • Writing Data-Heavy Stories: Edge the properties. Of course, there were some The marriage of data and HANDS-ON TRAINING gaps in our chronologies, but those missing pieces ended up helping us gain footholds narrative Class signups to be labeled in conversations with reluctant sources. In • Letting Graphics do Heavy Lifting “Beginner” or “Advanced” or “Everyone” many situations, people are more likely to talk • Managing and Editing the Data-Heavy Some already planned: with a reporter about a document and what it Story • Searches on the Internet means (or what it doesn’t say about an event) DATA ACCESS • Understanding how your computer han- than about a neighbor, business executive or • Public Access and Privacy: Surviving dles data gangster. Many people, be they pension fund officials what’s coming • Excel or underworld figures, take great care to guard • Federal FOIA and Cracking State Laws • Access their secrets, and there’s no FOIA that will force • Getting Data Without Getting Skinned • Downloading from the Internet those secrets out. In this case, the extra effort • International Data We Are Missing • Mapping required made it all that much more satisfying IN THE NEWSROOM • Data Cleaning when we were able to place a compelling story • CAR in the Newsroom of the Future: • SPSS – one the subjects thought was impossible to get – in front of our readers. Strategies for managers and advocates • The Power of Structured Query Lan- guage • Getting Out of the Corner and into the Jack Meyers has worked on investigative reporting Newsroom • Dealing with problems of SQL and political assignments for the Boston Herald • Software to Manage Projects • Servers since 1990. He has won first-place awards for • Doing CAR on a shoestring • Doing Math: How to figure out indexes, investigative reporting from the New England ratios and when to use them Press Association (1996, 1998) and the New • Finding Network Solutions to Share Data England Associated Press News Executives’ in the Newsroom Association (2000).

30 THE IRE JOURNAL BOOKS

FEN-PHEN STORY PROVIDES the fen-phen prescription, the woman added. One case does not an epidemic make. But GLIMPSE AT HOW DOCTORS, Ruff, who knew nothing at that point about the fen-phen movement, could not contain her curiosity. She mentioned the test results to DRUG MAKERS THINK her supervisor, who had seen a similar valve phenomenon that same afternoon on a differ- BY STEVE WEINBERG ent patient. Had that patient ingested any OF THE IRE JOURNAL drugs recently, Ruff asked. Yes, the supervisor replied. Fen-phen. “Another med tech might enfluramine and Phentermine, known both sides of the Linnen suit – not to mention have, probably would have, racked it up to as fen-phen, became a popular pre- other litigation in other states involving other coincidence, or perhaps made a little notation scription weight-loss drug in the late victims of fen-phen – that the mind reels. The to the cardiologists involved,” Mundy writes. F 1990s, but it became a deadly one list of characters she provides just before the “That’s all there’s time for and nobody listens when everyone from manufacturers to doctors introduction helps some, but is not a panacea. to echotechs anyway – any real problems would to government regulators dispensed with the Books should read as organic wholes, not be pinpointed by doctors. But Pam Ruff had truth in the name of profit. as a bunch of chapters strung together spent her childhood overdosing on Nancy Drew In chronicling this saga, Alicia Mundy, an much like distinct magazine articles with books. Within a week, she’d quietly begun experienced investigative journalist who lives forced transitional phrases. Mundy has not her sleuthing... Casually, with a shrug from in Washington, D.C., finds few true heroes mastered the art of book organization, but her supervisors and ‘lots of help’ from other or heroines. If there is a leading character the information is so inherently compelling techs and nurses, Pam began an unpaid, in the book it is probably Alex that most readers are likely unfunded study at MeritCare, and for the MacDonald, a plaintiff’s lawyer to stick with it – and should. next two years she kept track of every with the Boston firm of Robinson Will those who stick with it case at the clinic involving valve disease.” & Cole. His client, Mary Linnen, find anybody in this depressing Ruff qualified for heroine status in part because started taking fen-phen during morass to call hero or heroine? she had nothing selfish to gain from her role. spring 1996 on the advice of a One candidate could be Dr. Leo She simply cared about patients. Cardiologist Boston endocrinologist in order Lutwak, the FDA staff member Crary started hearing from Ruff. Her charting to lose weight before her wed- who tries from within the agency of cases looked thorough, but Crary could ding. After less than a month, to clamp down on the poten- find nothing – not one reference – in the vast Linnen, only 30, began experi- tially lethal fen-phen, only to be medical literature on a relationship between encing health problems such as rebuffed by federal government valve disease and fen-phen. Probably Ruff shortness of breath and dizziness. superiors who are too timid in was wrong. And even though she stopped general or too in awe of pharma- Crary did his best to block out Ruff’s taking fen-phen, the 23 days ceutical company clout to simply pestering, until the week before Christmas worth of pills had destroyed her DISPENSING WITH THE TRUTH: do the right thing. 1996, two years after Ruff started her charting. lungs. She died in1997. The Victims, the Drug Companies, But my candidates for hero/ That week, Crary examined a long-time patient. It seemed inevitable that Mac- and the Dramatic Story Behind heroine are a physician and a He took a look himself at the echocardiogram, the Battle Over Fen-Phen, by Alicia Donald, retained by Linnen’s Mundy, St. Martin’s Press, 402 nurse in Fargo, N.D. – Jack the kind Ruff produced regularly. Why were family, would draft a lawsuit pages, $24.95 Crary and Pam Ruff. Their roles the valves showing up so weird?, Crary involving American Home Prod- are a reminder that journalists wondered. She would probably need heart ucts, the parent company of pharmaceutical need to look beyond the usual sources in the surgery. Had she been taking any drugs?, manufacturer Wyeth-Ayerst; Fisons, a company usual places to tell stories fully and fairly. Crary asked his patient. Fen-phen, she replied. selling Phentermine; and Interneuron, a com- Mundy discovered that Ruff became enmeshed From that day forward, Crary was an advocate. pany involved in the invention of drugs that in the fen-phen controversy just before Christ- But for the most part, journalists were not came to be prescribed for weight loss. mas 1994. An echocardiogram sonographer paying attention to a doctor and a technician at the MeritCare Clinic in Fargo, she was in North Dakota, so they missed the story for Not the usual source analyzing tests run on a 40-year-old woman too long. Still, MacDonald is not always easy to suffering from shortness of breath and con- like. Mundy concedes that he possesses “an stant fatigue. Ruff had never seen aortic The body count enormous ego” and that at times during the and mitral valves look like that given the For journalists, this book provides plenty of Linnen case he “blew up, screwed up, or patient’s age and medical history. Curious, education about how physicians, pharmaceutical seemed foolish.” By the time MacDonald is Ruff asked the woman if she had been entrepreneurs, government regulators, judges, standing before the jury on page 310, Mundy taking any drugs. Fen-phen, the woman defense attorneys and especially plaintiffs’ has introduced so many lawyers, physicians, replied, as a way to lose weight. But she had attorneys think, and provides a reminder about

scientists, government bureaucrats, etc., on not been feeling all that well since filling CONTINUED ON PAGE 32 ×

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 31 FEATURES

Higher educations projects editor, helped focus all the data and Fundraising CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11 detail into six clearly defined stories, each CONTINUED FROM PAGE 15 outlook. They explained in detail the financial advancing a new element without repeating thing other than 501(c)(3) groups. We were pressures they were facing, as well as strategies what came before. He also forced me to keep on our own to contact each group that used they were using to overcome the problems. each story to a reasonable length – about 45 a solicitor. This provided rich detail that helped bring the inches. Later, other editors said the stories’ Meanwhile, to learn more about the data to life. length made the series accessible. companies, we checked websites for other It turned out that many of the colleges’ One benefit of this project was the chance states across the country to see how they coping strategies had their own risks, like to focus on a group of colleges that rarely gets regulated the solicitors. We downloaded increasing their debt burden to dangerous levels much attention. The media often focuses on copies of their blank registration forms to by constructing new technology centers. big research universities. But small schools see what information could be culled from can provide reporters with rewarding stories, records of companies doing business in Small college trends particularly if one looks for trends affecting Colorado. Some states even require solicitors During the meeting with each college, I them as a group. to list legal actions taken against them in explained exactly how I determined the school’s The response from readers was tremendous. other states. Most of them lied and omitted ratios and financial grade. As a result, they Many parents and students asked how they information we found from newspaper stories knew what was coming when the series ran, could obtain the same kind of financial data across the country. and had plenty of opportunity beforehand to for schools we didn’t include in our database. As the 990s rolled in more patterns quibble. In a few cases, they ran their own Perhaps most rewarding were the e-mails from developed. We databased the basic informa- analysis using my formulas – and uncovered college presidents, researchers and faculty tion from the 990s and where the money some errors on my part that I was able to fix across the country, who said the trends we was being spent. before the story ran. I also asked the schools wrote about have been discussed internally in Some organizations were still filing copies for audited financial statements, and some the academic world, but hadn’t been reported of their telephone scripts with the state, an obliged. These helped confirm the data in the in such a complete way by the mainstream old requirement in Colorado, but current in 990 forms. media. other states. We gathered up all the ones that This project proved discomforting for Even as the reporting continued, it seemed existed so we could see what contributors the colleges. They aren’t used to having the predictions of some of the experts were were being promised. They were being told their finances discussed publicly. Unlike a coming to pass. Last summer, two schools in their money was to be used for various publicly traded corporation, they don’t usually New England shut their doors for good. This benevolent programs in the community, but volunteer financial data. Nor are they subject past fall, a number of others announced they none was told the badge groups were actually to the accountability that comes from having were merging. We finished the series just in labor unions and that the dollars mostly went stockholders breathing down their necks. time. for lobbying and union organizing. The last piece of work before writing was As we compared the 990s to the solicita- old-fashioned legwork– finding students whose Jim O’Neill has been at The Philadelphia Inquirer tion scripts, the picture became clearer: personal stories would illustrate the trends. for the past six years, covering high education The public was being told dollars were for the last three years. Marc Duvoisin, The Inquirer’s special good causes, but the cops and firefighters rarely used much of the money for those purposes at all. Books of them. The dead had been buried in Wyeth’s Ultimately we determined just 18 cents of a Coloradan’s $1 contribution made it CONTINUED FROM PAGE 31 files, awaiting their day of resurrection… the document sang ‘punitive damages.’ The to the badge group, and just 2 cents of that made it to the causes that were promised never assuming anything. corporation knew, and didn’t tell – didn’t tell over the telephone. For example, when MacDonald and his doctors the number of cases was skyrocketing. lawyer colleagues win permission from a judge Yes, Wyeth had eventually shored up the Shock and dismay to examine documents at Wyeth’s corporate warning on the label somewhat, but not as In one unique case, we were able to headquarters, they didn’t expect to find anything soon as they knew the number of reports had determine that a solicitor who was pitching damning. But on the second day of tediously increased. And not before Mary Linnen had tickets to a benefit concert was actually combing through boxes of documents, the team taken the drugs.” overselling the venues by as much as 400 unearthed quite a find. percent, banking that hardly anyone who got “It was the body count,” Mundy writes. Steve Weinberg is senior contributing editor to The IRE Journal, a professor at the Missouri a ticket would show up to the event. “Six pages comprised a computerized listing School of Journalism and a former executive We needed to put faces with the story, from Wyeth of pulmonary hypertension from director of IRE. so we showed up at one of those concerts the early 1990s to mid-1997. There were 101

32 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES LEGAL CORNER and interviewed dozens of people who had purchased their tickets over the telephone. Their shock and dismay about what we had Electronic records found gave solid foundation to the story. We also found the solicitors to be a threaten FOIA difficult bunch to crack. Using leads from former telephone callers, and a brief session paper records, the agency hanging outside a few of the phone rooms, ecent efforts by government agencies should produce a copy we managed to get some insider information to resist disclosure of electronically Rstored records pursuant to freedom of of those portions of the about how the calling biz really worked. STEPHANIE S. ABRUTYN information laws represent a disturbing trend that database that contain dis- But we weren’t done. ultimately could render those laws obsolete. closable material. If the agency does not have Criminal record checks showed us some So far, the agencies’ success has been limited. a computer program to segregate or redact of the people working the phones were But until the courts definitively reject the notion the confidential material, it should write one hardly savory types. Nonetheless, they were that electronic records are somehow different, (generally at the expense of the requestor). representing public safety. What made the the Information Age threatens to banish most Unfortunately, numerous government agencies finds more significant was that some of those government records beyond the reach of freedom and at least one Connecticut state court judge with criminal pasts never bothered to file of information laws. have rejected this approach. any financial accounting with the state to Although they vary greatly in scope, freedom show what they did with the money they of information acts (FOIA) in virtually every $20 million fee raised. The state’s records were littered with state and the federal FOIA have certain basic In September 1999, Hartford Courant reporter warning letters and referrals to the district elements in common. First, FOIA generally Jack Dolan made a routine FOIA request to the attorney. requires government agencies to provide copies Connecticut Department of Public Safety (DPS) Following the document trail, we learned of all documents to any member of the press for a copy of all of the fields of information in the district attorney did nothing with the or public who asks, as long as the requested the DPS database typically produced on an adult letters, ignoring them. In fact, some of the documents do not fall within an enumerated “rap sheet.” Paper copies of individual rap sheets more notorious solicitors who were being exception. The presumption is openness, and routinely are provided to journalists. Dolan prosecuted in other states were still raising the burden rests on the agency to prove that any offered to pay the cost of developing a computer money in Colorado and officials here were specific request may be denied. program to redact confidential information (such unaware of it. Second, if a requested record contains some as juvenile convictions). DPS agreed to produce The system was deficient in many, many material that is not subject to disclosure under the requested portions of the database, which ways and through painstaking research of FOIA, the agency cannot simply withhold the clearly do not fall within a FOIA exception. how the system was supposed to work, we entire document. It must redact that specific Instead of the cost of the computer program, were able to show how it didn’t. information – using a black marker, correction however, DPS sought to impose a charge of Reactions were swift. The district attor- fluid, or anything else – and produce a copy of over $20 million – calculated by multiplying the ney, the attorney general, the secretary of the document. standard fee for producing a copy of a single state and several legislators pounced on a Third, an agency is not required to create a rap sheet ($25) by the number of records in the need for new, stricter laws. Investigations new document in response to a FOIA request. database (815,000). of some of the solicitors were launched, The government only must produce what it Following Connecticut procedure, Dolan consumer complaints rolled in and several already has. appealed to the Freedom of Information Com- of the solicitors closed shop. Several of Each of these fundamental tenets seems mission, which upheld DPS’s fee. Dolan then the badge groups ditched their solicitors straightforward, and usually is when old- took the case to court, where a Superior Court and decided to go it alone, a process we fashioned paper records are involved. Either judge decided that DPS did not have to produce highlighted in a story about a badge group the document exists or it does not. Either mate- the record at all. The court found that “the that was successful in its fund raising without rial needs to be blacked out, or it does not. requested Department database was not in contracting with a pro. If information needs to be redacted and the existence. . . . [T]he existing database would There are still repercussions being felt agency does not have a black marker it gets one. have to be altered to exclude non-conviction and by year’s end, Colorado likely will have But what about when the records sought are information.” In other words, the redacted one of the more efficient systems set up electronic? And, what if the database contains database, containing only the material subject to police the people raising money for the some information that must be disclosed and to disclosure, is a “new” document. The judge police. some that does not have to be? also pointed out that the program to be used David Migoya is a member of the projects Analogizing the situation to one involving CONTINUED ON PAGE 35 × team at The Denver Post and is a past IRE Stephanie S. Abrutyn currently serves as Counsel/East Coast Media for the Tribune Company. Prior to Award winner. joining the Tribune Company, she worked in the Litigation and Employment Practices group of the ABC law department and in private practice at Baker & Hostetler in Washington, D.C.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 33 FEATURES MEMBER NEWS

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5 won a national Edward R. Murrow Award for Chapel Hill. Marc Duvoisin has moved small markets for their three-part series, from The Philadelphia Inquirer, where he “No Entry,” about widespread mistreat- was assistant managing editor/enterprise, ment of asylum seekers and foreign trav- to the Los Angeles Times, where he will elers in the Portland airport. Maria be assistant managing editor. Duvoisin Henson has moved from deputy editorial will oversee the Times’s Column One and page editor to assistant managing editor Sunday Report and edit selected projects for enterprise with the Austin American- and enterprise. Virginia Ellis is now Sac- Statesman’s newly created enterprise team. ramento bureau chief for the Los Angeles Reporter Mike Ward has joined the team Times. Elaine Grossman was awarded after 11 years on the state desk in Austin. first place for Best Investigative Report- Two IRE members were awarded Nieman ing of 2000 from the Newsletter and fellowships for 2001-2002: Barbara Ser- Electronic Publishers Foundation. The rano of The Seattle Times and recent IRE award was given for an article on the Board member Roberta Baskin of ABC origins of the Defense Department’s con- News “20/20.” Michael Anft is now troversial anthrax immunization program. assistant editor of The Chronicle of Philan- Duane Pohlman moves to chief investiga- thropy in Washington, D.C., while still free- tive reporter at WEWS-Cleveland from the lancing with City Paper in Baltimore, Md. same position at KING-Seattle. He is also Charlie Cantu has become an investiga- an IRE Board member. Bruce Shapiro tive producer for KTVT-Dallas. She was is co-author, with the Rev. Jesse Jackson, formerly a producer with 48 Hours in of a new book on capital punishment Dallas, where she worked for six years entitled Legal Lynching: The Death Penalty before joining KTVT. Ira Chinoy has and America’s Future, published this fall by moved from The Washington Post, where he The New Press. Darcy Spears, a reporter was director of computer-assisted report- with KVBC-Las Vegas, was on a three- ing, to the University of Maryland’s Philip person team that won a national Edward Merrill College of Journalism. Chinoy, R. Murrow Award in news documentary for who makes the move after 24 years in her 30-minute special, “Honor Thy Father.” newspapers, will teach computer-assisted The investigation exposed a lack of protec- reporting and other courses for the next tion in the legal system for children who three years. Matthew B. Dees placed are forced to testify against their parents third in the writing category in Hearst’s in court. Mc Nelly Torres, formerly with annual writing, photojournalism and The Lawton Constitution in Oklahoma, has broadcast news championships. Earlier joined the Morning News in Florence, S.C. in the year, Dees took a first place Hearst She will be covering city and county gov- Award in the editorial writing category for ernments and working on special assign- a piece he wrote while interning at the St. ments and investigations. Richard Weil Petersburg Times. Dees graduated in May has moved from executive editor to proj- from the University of North Carolina at ects editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

34 THE IRE JOURNAL Houston column IRE SERVICES

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 4 INVESTIGATIVE REPORTERS AND EDITORS, INC. is a grassroots nonprofit organization help is available after the on-site training or dedicated to improving the quality of investigative reporting within the field of for those who can’t get to a workshop. In journalism. IRE was formed in 1975 with the intent of creating a networking tool and a particular, Aron Pilhofer, the new director of forum in which journalists from across the country could raise questions and exchange our Campaign Finance Information Center, ideas. IRE provides educational services to reporters, editors and others interested in is in the midst of a major revamping of the investigative reporting and works to maintain high professional standards. center’s site, www.campaignfinance.com, so Programs and Services: that it can provide more help for journalists IRE RESOURCE CENTER – A rich reserve of print and broadcast stories, tipsheets and guides to help working on local and state issues. you start and complete the best work of your career. This unique library is the starting point of At the same time, plans for a new Reporters any piece you’re working on. You can search through abstracts of more than 17,000 investigative Handbook to come out early next year remain reporting stories through our Web site. on schedule. This edition of the Handbook, Contact: Pat Coleman, [email protected], 573-882-3364 while keeping much of the previous material, will include new story examples, new tips and DATABASE LIBRARY – Administered by IRE and the National Institute for Computer-Assisted numerous Web sites that can help a reporter Reporting. The library has copies of many government databases, and makes them available to news whether on daily, beat or project stories. organizations at or below actual cost. Analysis services are available on these databases, as is help in In addition, the IRE staff will maintain deciphering records you obtain yourself. Web pages that will provide updates to Contact: Jeff Porter, [email protected], 573-884-7711 information in the Handbook, particularly on CAMPAIGN FINANCE INFORMATION CENTER – Administered by IRE and the National Institute for links to the Web sites. Computer-Assisted Reporting. It’s dedicated to helping journalists uncover the campaign money trail. State campaign finance data is collected from across the nation, cleaned and made available to journalists. A search engine allows reporters to track political cash flow across several states Legal Corner in federal and state races. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 33 Contact: Aron Pilhofer, [email protected], 573-882-2042 to eliminate the confidential data would be “a ON-THE-ROAD TRAINING – As a top promoter of journalism education, IRE offers loads of training modified program that the Department ‘would opportunities throughout the year. Possibilities range from national conferences and regional devise.’” Then, citing the cases involving paper workshops to weeklong bootcamps and on-site newsroom training. Costs are on a sliding scale and records that explicitly state FOIA does not fellowships are available to many of the events. require an agency to create documents, the Contact: Ron Nixon, [email protected], 573-882-2042 judge dismissed Dolan’s case. The Nassau County District Attorney’s office took a similar Publications position when Newsday sought a copy of the THE IRE JOURNAL – Published six times a year. Contains journalist profiles, how-to stories, reviews, DA’s criminal information database. investigative ideas and backgrounding tips. The Journal also provides members with the latest news on upcoming events and training opportunities from IRE and NICAR. Electronic record battle Contact: Len Bruzzese, [email protected], 573-882-2042 Not all judges who have considered the UPLINK – Monthly newsletter by IRE and NICAR on computer-assisted reporting. Often, Uplink issue of access to electronic records under stories are written after reporters have had particular success using data to investigate stories. The FOIA neglect basic common sense. columns include valuable information on advanced database techniques as well as success stories The Illinois Supreme Court, for example, written by newly trained CAR reporters. accurately observed that interpreting the Contact: Jeff Porter, [email protected], 573-884-7711 FOIA as the Connecticut Superior Court did “would effectively gut the act.” (Family Life REPORTER.ORG – A collection of Web-based resources for journalists, journalism educators and League v. Department of Public Aid, 112 Ill. 2d others. Discounted Web hosting and services such as mailing list management and site development 449,1986). But until the courts or legislatures are provided to other nonprofit journalism organizations. unequivocally declare that electronic records Contact: Ted Peterson, [email protected], 573-884-7321 must receive equal treatment under FOIA, the prospect of fighting a long, expensive legal For information on: battle each time a reporter seeks electronic ADVERTISING – Len Bruzzese, [email protected], 573-882-2042 records will remain. MEMBERSHIP AND SUBSCRIPTIONS – John Green, [email protected], 573-882-2772 That possibility, combined with the gov- CONFERENCES AND BOOT CAMPS – Ev Ruch-Graham, [email protected], 573-882-8969 ernment’s increasing reliance on electronic LIST SERVES – Ted Peterson, [email protected], 573-884-7321 records, could produce a loophole large enough Mailing Address: to swallow FOIA. IRE, 138 Neff Annex, Missouri School of Journalism, Columbia, Mo. 65211

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001 35