The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "Roberts County" ...
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Grandma can’t accept your call: Inmates disconnected by phone costs
This series of stories started with a simple question. Why does it cost so much for inmates to make calls from the Cook County Jail? In the course of my reporting on criminal and legal affairs for WBEZ, the public radio station in Chicago, I had heard numerous people complain about the high cost of phone calls. Some digging confirmed that the price could be as high as $15.00 for 15 minute calls. Three or four calls a week at that price gets expensive even for financially stable middle class folks, but the people paying these fees were mostly the poorest residents in Chicago. That’s because most of the people in the Cook County Jail are there because they and their families couldn’t afford to post bond of a couple thousand, or sometimes even just hundreds of dollars to secure their freedom while awaiting trial. They are the people who are least able to afford such expensive phone calls. A few FOIA requests revealed the scheme (and scheme is the right word… I just looked it up: a crafty or secret plan of action). Cook County gave an exclusive phone contract to a company called Securus Technologies. Securus charged inflated phone rates and their exclusive deal in the jail meant inmates wanting to talk to their families or arrange their defense had no choice but to pay the rates. Securus then paid back to the county 57½ percent of the revenue from the calls. It netted the county about $4 million a year. Securus wouldn’t tell us their take but I imagine they did alright too. All of the money was coming out of the pockets of the poorest residents in Cook County, people who couldn’t even afford to post bond for their freedom. (As an aside, this isn’t just an issue in Cook County. According to its website Securus provides the phone systems for 850,000 inmates in 2,200 jails and prisons across the country.) Our reporting shed public light on a hugely profitable contract that no one was paying attention to. We documented the lives of the impoverished people getting hammered by the policy and then turned the hammer on the local elected officials to ask them to explain how this was a good policy. The public officials responded in a way that once again proved the genius of democracy. Our efforts and the results are detailed in subsequent answers below.
Tags: prison inmates; phone calls; fees
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Paying out millions, and playing favorites
The series explored favoritism and ethical lapses in the way Sarasota County government awarded lucrative contracts to private vendors. We found that the county relied too much on "piggybacking," a purchasing shortcut that allowed low and middle-level employees to essentially award contracts to whoever they wanted without bids.
Tags: Sarasota County; private vendors; piggybacking; contracts
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Carbon Monoxide at Cove Village
Even though, three people died of carbon monoxide in their apartment complex, the problem went uncorrected for four years afterwards. Also, even when the emergency calls continued to report carbon monoxide problems and a number of people were brought to the hospital, the government inspectors never stepped in to correct the hazard.
Tags: Essex complex; Wiley family; County Fire Department; toxic; Sawyer Realty; firefighters
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"Dodging DWIs"
The criminal justice system in St. Louis "has failed to punish drunken drivers." After multiple people were killed in drunk driving related accidents, reporters revealed that in St. Louis County, felony charges were not often issued to repeat offenders. Few people accused of a DWI actually have it placed on their record. Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has called for an examination of the broken system.
Tags: Jay Nixon; Robert McCulloch; St. Louis; St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney; drunk driving; DWI; DUI; driving while intoxicated
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"Meltdown"
After the Eureka Ice and Cold Storage company suddenly closed its doors in 2008, businesses were left scrambling to find a new way to get their ice. The Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services that ordered the company shut its doors, would not discuss the case. HSU journalism students eventually found that before the company closed it had several citations and violations of "public health and safety laws" going back for years.
Tags: Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services; Eureka Ice and Cold Storage; Dennis Hunter; Humboldt Maritime Museum; Cutten Realty
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Sex Offenders Near Bus Stops
WTEV-TV found that sex offenders in Duval County, Florida, were living in areas surrounding school bus stops, often within two blocks. This included offenders who had targeted children.
Tags: sex offenders; schools; school district; bus stops; children; students; education; sexual predators;
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Palm Beach County's Culture of Corruption
"Dubocq uncovered a series of complicated real estate transactions that secretly benefited two Palm Beach County commissioners. The commissioners voted on matters that enhanced the deals without disclosing their private interests." The reporters filed more than four dozen state FOIA requests to tell this story.
Tags: state government; county government; FOIA; real estate; development
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Who Took Land From Our Churches?
Cook County's District attorney, along with his associates, were found to have taken 60 parcels of land that were owned by 20 churhces, businesses and not-for-profit organizations. They were unaware the land was even pirated from them until the report came out in the Chicago Tribune.
Tags: fraud; realty; land; ownership; property; steal; stolen; acre
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Mesa Community College
Community College administrators have been travelling to expensive international destinations, at the expense of taxpayers. The Republic investigatesd, finding "while the trips were billed as intense working sessions, financial records revealed that 87 college officials were spending more time sightseeing than working." Maricopa Community Colleges had presented the trips as part of a push to create an online learning program in China, "and to create partnerships with colleges in the Netherlands and England." That system includes 10 county colleges with an operating budget on $900 million. The investigation found that the director of the China Project "was hiding expenses from the college, writing herself contracts for work she didn't perform and paying employees overtime they didn't work as a form of reward." As a result of the stories, Mesa Community College suspended international travel.
Tags: Maricopa Community Colleges; Mesa Community College; College officials; travel; tax dollars
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The Troubles at King/ Drew
The reporters began with a basic analysis of all the hospitals in the Los Angeles County public hospital system. They found that the most severe problems and violations were happening at Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, formed after the 1965 Watts riots to serve the poor of southern Los Angeles. The problems ranged from underfunding to staff misdiagnoses, accidental patient deaths, and racist politics on the hospital's Board of Supervisors. The reporters also interviewed healthcare experts and published six detailed possible solutions to the problems facing the hospital.
Tags: healthcare; doctors; pathologist; Medical Board of California; American Medical Association; medical malpractice; civil rights