Veteran Chicago journalist Ben Austen’s new book, “Correction: Parole, Prison and the Possibility of Change,” examines the criminal justice system through the experiences of two teens imprisoned for four decades after murder convictions and repeatedly denied parole. To research the book, with support from the Fund, Austen sat in on parole hearings in Illinois, visited prisons, halfway houses and clemency ...
As part of InvestigateWest’s ongoing investigation into the billion-dollar “troubled teen,” industry, supported by the Fund, the nonprofit newsroom published new in-depth pieces that analyzed problems at youth facilities across Idaho. The reporting detailed how Idaho officials rescued one girl but then sent her to a state-licensed facility where she was preyed upon again. The series has described an environment ...
The Baton Rouge Advocate and the Times Picayune, with support from the Fund, found that Louisiana’s home insurance market fell apart in recent years because the state moved insurance policies to small, regional companies with risky business models. Eleven of 12 home insurance companies that failed had sent hundreds of millions of dollars in premiums to affiliates, which are subject ...
In an investigation for Borderless Magazine about conditions for migrants in Chicago, more than a dozen people told reporter Nissa Rhee that they endured cramped living quarters, mistreatment by shelter workers, freezing temperatures and dirty bathrooms. With support from the Fund, Rhee also described outbreaks of various illnesses, including chickenpox, the flu and upper-respiratory infections, spreading without sufficient medical attention. ...
Reporter Alleen Brown, with support from the Fund, examined public records to find new details about how the U.S. Department of Homeland Security laid the groundwork for Georgia law enforcement to file terrorism charges against environmental protesters camping in the woods to protest a new police facility. DHS monitored online posts critical of a $90 million proposed police training center ...
With support from the Fund, reporter Keith Schneider is writing a continuing series of stories on connections between Big Ag and water pollution. Earlier stories in the series looked at the health impact of farms using large volumes of pesticides that contain nitrate, focusing in part on Minnesota – and last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency directed three Minnesota government ...
The San Diego Housing Commission hands out about $300 million in federal money annually to help low-income tenants pay rent. When landlords want to increase the rent, the Housing Commission must first approve — and it does so nine times out of 10, reporter Cody Dulaney found. Dulaney sifted through data to find that in 2022, the commission fielded more than ...
Emily Carter and Kieria Krieger told Idaho state officials about evidence of child abuse and sexual assault against residents at the youth facility where they worked, as well as sexual harassment against employees. With support from the Fund, reporter Wilson Criscione dug into their claims and others, documenting a pattern of misconduct and poor oversight of the facility. As a ...
The Texas Observer did a deep dive into money and key actors behind right-wing takeovers of local school boards in the state. Reporter Steve Monacelli, with a grant and other support from the Fund, scoured campaign finance reports to find that dozens of ultraconservative school board candidates were backed by political action committees that employ many of the same conservative ...
Columbia Journalism Investigations, NPR, its member station WVXU in Cincinnati and the Ohio Newsroom built a first-of-its-kind database about prosecutorial misconduct by analyzing thousands of pages of Ohio state court appellate decisions from 2018 to 2021. With support from the Fund, the team examined hundreds of cases to identify claims of prosecutorial misconduct, and also reviewed hundreds of pages of ...