>> Producer Marc Shaffer talks about shooting "A Sea of Trouble" and reporter Eric Nalder's "hypnotic" interview techniques. Read an interview with Marc Shaffer.
>> Read Nalder's guide to interviewing "Loosening Lips" -- with tips for setting up the interview and dealing with reluctant sources.
Eric Nalder is no rookie when it comes to hard-hitting investigative reporting. A two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Nalder has a long track record of award-winning work:
When the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound stunned the nation, Nalder and an investigative team from THE SEATTLE TIMES investigated the disaster and exposed weaknesses in the regulations on tankers. (1990 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting)
Staff reporters for THE SEATTLE TIMES, including Nalder, won the prestigious Goldsmith Prize for exposing the scandals of former Washington Senator Brockman “Brock” Adams. In the story, the team reported on how several women claimed they were sexually harassed and physically molested by the congressman over the course of two decades. (1993 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting)
In January 1995 an arsonist set ablaze a large warehouse in Seattle. Four firefighters died. Eric Nalder and Duff Wilson looked into the Seattle Fire Department's handling of the blaze and found the deaths might have been prevented if standard procedures had been followed. (1996 Society of Professional Journalists “Excellence in Journalism” Investigative Reporting Award)
Nalder and a team of reporters for THE SEATTLE TIMES investigated the mismanagement of housing funds for Native Americans on reservations. They found that much of the $3 million the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development distributed to tribal-housing authorities was improperly disbursed. Instead of sending money to low-income families, corrupt officials sent the HUD money to recipients who lived well above the poverty line, including a millionaire former pro-football player. (1997 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting)
Eric Nalder, Kim Barker, and Anne Koch investigated the abuse of elderly and disabled residents in long-term-care facilities in Washington state. In one case a husband abused and imprisoned his disabled wife on a sailboat while he was being paid by the state to take care of her. (2001 Clarion Award Investigative Reporting)
After the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989, oil companies assured America accidents like that would never happen again.
But another accident did happen. On October 13, 2004, roughly 1,000 gallons of crude oil spilled into the Puget Sound estuary, near Tacoma, Washington. The spill blackened the beaches and waters, threatening aquatic plants, seabirds and fish. Unlike the Exxon Valdez spill, it was not clear who caused the spill and nobody claimed responsibility for the accident.
Enter veteran journalist Eric Nalder. On March 22, 2005, the SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER published the first article in a series detailing the safety concerns of oil tankers belonging to the international energy corporation, ConocoPhillips. Although ConocoPhillips denied responsibility, the Coast Guard had traced the oil to a tanker owned by ConocoPhillips’ subsidiary Polar Tankers as early as December 2004. Nalder’s reporting revealed systemic problems within the company that were undermining the very safety reforms implemented in direct response to the Exxon Valdez spill. Safety concerns included requiring crews to work long hours, ignoring possible alcohol abuse by crew members, and company efforts to diminish tug escort requirements in Washington State waters. Moreover, Nalder found evidence alleging that crewmembers aboard another Polar tanker had participated in an oil-spill cover-up.
In EXPOSÉ's "A Sea of Trouble," Nalder's doggedness and trademarked interview techniques help shed light on a murky situation.
The SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER looks into the safety of oil tankers in the Pacific Northwest and reveals problems that suggest another Exxon Valdez could happen again.
NPR reporter Daniel Zwerdling also delved into a different type of institutional abuse, this time within the United States Army. In a moving report last December, Zwerdling told the story of soldiers who returned from Iraq and Afghanistan to Colorado’s Fort Carson with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other mental health problems, including suicidal thoughts and drug abuse. But despite the Army’s professed commitment to taking care of veterans’ mental health, the soldiers said that they received harassment and hazing, not sympathy, when they confided in their commanders for help, even sometimes receiving dishonorable discharges from the military.
Report says detention centers are failing immigrants
Daniel Zwerdling's reporting revealed the abuses that some immigrant detainees were subjected to in federal prisons and local jails. A new study by the Government Accountability Office takes Zwerdling's reporting one step further: not only are immigrant detainees being abused and mistreated, they are being prevented from pleading their cases due to a lack of access to phones and counsel, and some are even being denied medical care.
A recent article in THE NEW YORK TIMES reports that key parts of the detainee system are stretched beyond capacity and inmates are being sent to facilities in other states in order to relieve overcrowding. Moving inmates to another state, however, “puts stress on tenuous family bonds” making visits by family members and counsel they may try to provide much more difficult; THE NEW YORK TIMES article further argues that moves to other facilities may be “inhibiting the ability of inmates to receive health care.”
The increase in prison populations is due not only to bolstered border patrols but, as Zwerdling pointed out in his reporting, to renewed enforcement of a decade-old statute in immigration law which allows the government to indefinitely detain immigrants, even those in the country legally, if they’ve ever committed a crime, no matter how trivial.
Prisoners attacked by dogs, denied medical attention, and threatened with solitary confinement. No, these allegations weren't from Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo. The alleged abuses happened right here in the U.S. -- at immigrant detention centers.
Immigration reform in the 1990s created a new class of prisoner. Non-citizens, living in the United States either legally or illegally, who committed any crime at any time, are subject to deportation. Pending a decision from the Department of Homeland Security, the immigrants are held at one of hundreds of detention centers around the country.
NPR reporter Daniel Zwerdling first heard of such facilities, and rumors of abuse inside them, from a New York immigrants' advocate. One particularly heinous case stood out: the 2004 death of a 34-year-old Jamaican immigrant held in Louisiana for a decade-old conviction. But confronted with a stone wall from authorities, and little access to the other inmates who witnessed the death, Zwerdling struggled to gain any traction.
This week on EXPOSÉ, how Zwerdling used sources inside the prison to uncover harrowing tales of prisoner abuse on American soil.
>> Listen to Zwerdling's original NPR series investigating the alleged abuse of two men detained by the Department of Homeland Security in two separate New Jersey prisons: "Jailed Immigrants Allege Abuse" and his moving piece using eyewitness testimony from several inmates to take listeners' step-by-step through the events leading up to "The Death of Richard Rust" at Louisiana's Oakdale Federal Detention Center.
EXPOSÉ producer Marc Shaffer talks about villains and anonymous sources
in "Charity Begins at Home" and what it is like to work with renowned investigative
journalists like Donald Barlett and James Steele ("Friends in High Places"),
and bulldog reporter Eric Nalder ("A Sea of Trouble").
"Charity Begins at Home" airs on PBS tonight. Check local listings for your area.
And on the Web: a bonus episode and photo essay.
In May of 2005, Chicago Tribune reporter Cam Simpson and photographer José Moré set off for Nepal and Jordan to piece together the story of how 12 Nepalese men were killed en route to their new jobs in Iraq. Their groundbreaking reporting became the basis for last season’s "Blame Somebody Else" – the Emmy-nominated episode now posted on our website.
>> View a slideshow of images from Nepal and Jordan by photographer José Moré, who was recognized along with Simpson with the George Polk Award for International Reporting.
To understand more about larger-than-life businessman Bob Jones and his company, the National Center for Employment of the Disabled (NCED), OREGONIAN photographer Faith Cathcart headed to El Paso, Texas, with reporter Jeff Kosseff. "It just felt like this was a terribly important story, and I wanted to do it right," Cathcart recalls.
Texas businessman under investigation for using funds meant to help the disabled
Since 1971, the government has supported a program to channel federal funds to non-profits that train and employ workers who are blind or severely disabled. Known as JWOD (named after the law that created it, the Javits-Wagner-O'Day act), the program eventually came to have an over $2 billion dollar budget. But no one, it appears, was keeping track of where that money was going.
Enter Bob Jones, an opportunistic businessman in El Paso, Texas. When journalists from The Oregonian took a closer look at his non-profit -- JWOD's number one contractor, the National Center for the Employment of the Disabled -- they found he was using the system, and federal tax dollars, to his advantage. In 2005 alone, NCED had been awarded federal contracts worth $276 million.
JWOD requires that two-thirds of an employer's workforce be blind or severely disabled before it can qualify for federal funds. Jones slipped through the cracks by claiming his Spanish-speaking workers from over the border were "disadvantaged."
Tomorrow on EXPOSÉ, did a well-intentioned government program became a cash machine for businessmen bent on enriching themselves at the expense of the disabled?
>> Check back on Wednesday to view the full episode of "Charity Begins at Home" online.
Government Inc.: “The Good, the Bad and the Sometimes Very Unsettling”
On July 9, 2007, The Washington Post launched Government Inc., a blog written by investigative reporter Robert O’Harrow, Jr. which promises to “shine the bright light of reporting on the good, the bad, and the sometimes very unsettling” in the often byzantine world of federal contracting. O’Harrow and his reporting partner Scott Higham went deep inside that world for their award-winning investigative reporting,“The High Price of Homeland Security,” which was the basis for EXPOSÉ’s “Nice Work If You Can Get It.” And more recently, Higham and O’Harrow have exposed some “very unsettling” accusations about GSA head Lurita Doan. Watch the end of “Nice Work” to find out what they found out.
While Scott Higham has set his sights elsewhere in recent months, O’Harrow’s decision to blog about the government’s business raises his interest in procurement to a new level. Admitting in his inaugural post that “federal contracting may seem about as enticing as a plate of raw broccoli,” O’Harrow has nevertheless found an impassioned, dedicated core audience for his daily postings on government contractors. Companies like Sun Microsystems , SAIC, and Wackenhut Corp. have been discussed in the blog as well as and how our government is (or isn’t) keeping tabs on them.
Less a forum for breaking news than riffing on it, O’Harrow tells the Blog it's too soon to talk about the tips and kinds of materials he is receiving but that “there's no question the blog is useful for generating ideas and help.” In the meantime, O’Harrow has used his blog to let his readers know what you’re not hearing in the Washington Post’s reporting. Last week, he reminded blog readers that the President had failed to act in response to the Special Counsel’s recommendation that GSA Head Lurita Doan be disciplined “to the fullest extent” for violations of the Hatch Act. (See 8/7/2007 posting: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/government-inc/). O’Harrow concludes, “I'm standing by,” ready to report.
>>Read more from Robert O'Harrow, Jr.about Government Inc. here.
EXPOSÉ's "Nice Work If You Can Get It" airs tonight on PBS. Check local listings.
>> Producer Joe Rubin talks about working with veteran investigative reporters Scott Higham and Robert O’Harrow, the legacy of "Deep Throat," and a very important parking garage. Read his producer notes here.
Assistant managing editor Jeff Leen knows it was a good decision to pair Scott Higham with Robert O’Harrow, Jr. for their reporting on Department of Homeland Security spending. With over 40 years of reporting experience between them, Higham and O’Harrow are undeniably strong investigative reporters, and, simply put, says Leen, “two good reporters are better than one.” Higham, a cop’s son (a path he almost pursued himself), is comfortable talking to people on the street, cultivating sources. O’Harrow is good with technology, whether sifting through databases or digging up web pages that have been taken down by people because they don’t want anybody to see what used to be up. His reporting partner kids, “he’d be a great CIA agent or NSA spook.” “As they’ve worked together, each has become more like the other,” says Leen, “there’s been kind of almost a perfect blending of skills.”
Billions of dollars in government spending meant to make us safer after 9/11. Airport screeners, portal radiation monitors, explosive detection systems, and an elaborate electronic network to track visitors and ease legitimate travel using fingerprint readers.
This week on EXPOSÉ, the story of two reporters who followed the money flowing out of the Department of Homeland security and found case after case of failed programs.
>> Read The Washington Post’s original reporting on "The High Price of Homeland Security." View The Washington Post’s graphic presentation on where the “billions of dollars worth of contracts for security systems aimed at preventing another terrorist attack” have gone.
>>And explore Higham and O’Harrow’s recent and ongoing coverage on the federal contracting beat, focusing on the politics and the GSA.
Blog content provided this week by the EXPOSÉ production team.
A tip from a legendary Washington Post reporter. A highly sensitive internal government document. Veteran investigative journalists.
>>Find out how Washington Post reporters Scott Higham and Robert O'Harrow, Jr. got the goods on the government contractors and the Department of Homeland Security in EXPOSÉ's "Nice Work If You Can Get It." Watch the preview. The full episode streams online tomorrow.
Taking FEMA to Court: Decision "opens doors" for reporters
For the SOUTH FLORIDA SUN-SENTINEL reporters to figure out who was receiving federal disaster aid, they first needed names and addresses from FEMA. When FEMA denied their request, the SUN-SENTINEL took them to court. This past June, in an unprecedented decision, a federal appeals court ruled in the newspaper's favor, requiring FEMA to release the addresses, though not the names, of disaster aid recipients.
Today is the deadline for FEMA to file for a rehearing. They have until September 20 to petition the Supreme Court to review the case.
The Blog spoke to Rachel Fugate, an attorney who represented the SUN-SENTINEL in its case against FEMA. "I think a lot of newspapers were waiting to see what would happen with this case," Fugate told the Blog. "I think it might open up a door for a lot of news entities to make requests for this type of information in their reporting."
EXPOSÉ's "Crisis Mismanagement" premieres on PBS tonight. Check local listings. Find out how the SOUTH FLORIDA SUN-SENTINEL uncovered massive waste and mismanagement at FEMA a year before Hurricane Katrina.
What ever happened to FEMA's former director, "heck-of-a-job" Michael Brown?
View our timeline of the federal aid crisis after Hurricanes Frances and Katrina, and the ensuing fallout at FEMA.
In the wake of Hurricane Frances, reporters at the SOUTH FLORIDA SUN-SENTINEL got down to business reporting the aftermath. But while analyzing maps of FEMA aid recipients, they noticed a strange pattern: The storm hit in the north, but the aid dollars were flowing south.
This week on EXPOSÉ, three reporters follow the money to reveal the internal chaos at FEMA a year before it was on anybody’s radar screen. Watch "Crisis Mismanagement" online.
Funders for Exposé: America's Investigative Reports include: Anderson Family Charitable Fund, The Jacob Burns Foundation, The Betsy & Jesse Fink Foundation, Philip Harper, Park Foundation, Blanchette Hooker Rockefeller Fund, Bernard & Irene Schwartz, and Tracy & Eric Semler.
