What happens when reporters do their job
Very good article on how investigative reporting can actually work:
A Sacramento TV station is reporting that Chandra Levy’s parents received a call from authorities Friday afternoon notifying them that an arrest would be coming soon in the 2001 murder of their daughter.
A Washington, D.C., station says D.C. police "submitted evidence to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in an effort to get an arrest warrant" for Ingmar Guandique, identified in a 13-part Washington Post series as a suspect whose possible role in the crime was given less attention by law enforcement than the possible role of then-California representative Gary Condit.
In published notes about the series, the Post says, "The reporters discovered that the police investigation was overwhelmed with the white-hot media coverage fueled by the possible involvement of Rep. Gary Condit, a congressman from California."
Condit granted his first interview about the Chandra Levy case to Post reporters Sari Horwitz and Scott Higham for their series, published July 13-27, 2008.
The reporters also spoke with officials involved in the original investigation, two women attacked by Guandique, and Guandique himself.
In their Reporters’ Notebook, they list all the new information published in their series, including that as of July 27, "D.C. police and the prosecutors working on the Chandra Levy case have never interviewed the two women who were attacked in the park by Guandique."
The Washington Post reports that the investigation has recently focused on Guandique:
Continue reading. When reporters don’t simply accept and print "official views," their work can be very powerful.
