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 "US West" ...
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17
Illinois is one of 12 states in the U.S. in which a minor who faces a felony charge is prosecuted in the "adult penal system." In this Chicago Reporter investigation, Angela Caputo reveals that the majority of minors charged with a felony and prosecuted as an adult are black 17-year-old males. She also reveals that most of the cases involve nonviolent crimes like "low-level drug sales" and "property theft."
Tags: felony; Chicago; Austin; Humboldt Park; North Lawndale; Roseland; West Englewood; Cook County; McArthur Foundation
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World of Trouble
This story is a “rare account of the forces that created the U.S. housing bubble and tore the world economy to pieces”. The major finding of the story was executives inside one of the largest lending companies, deliberately ignored warnings from their front line salesmen. This company was loaning money to people who would not be able to pay them back and later was victim to “more than 30 billion dollars of bad loans”.
Tags: World Savings and Loan; Golden West Financial; Wachovia; bank; mortgage; industry; Paul Bishop; homeowners
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Atalissa
For three decades a dozen mentally disabled men have been living together. Their living conditions were nowhere near ideal; they lived in a run-down bunkhouse and worked full-time in a turkey processing plant. They normally made about “$65 a month”, but sometimes received as “little as 40 cents an hour”. The series revealed possible “human trafficking, abuse and neglect, and financial exploitation of the mentally disabled”.
Tags: Henry's Turkey Service; US Department of Labor; health inspectors; mistreatment; West Liberty Foods; Muscatine County
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Drill Dangers
Gas industry-funded geologists announced a new estimate of 4000 trillion cubic feet of natural gas beneath the Marcellus Shale in New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and Maryland, enough gas to satisfy the needs of the entire U.S. for up to 40 years. That estimate, combined with escalating natural gas prices, has caused a drilling boom in Pennsylvania. The stories discovered that Marcellus Shale drillers are drawing the millions of gallons of water needed for each well from streams, rivers and reservoirs, with no oversight or regulation. our report detailed how that practice has already caused at least two streams to run dry.
Tags: environment; natural gas; drilling boom; Pennsylvania's Right To Know Law; gas well permits; Marcellus Shale wells;
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Bridge Tracker
After 13 people died in August 2007 when a freeway bridge fell into the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, governors across the nation rushed to calm fears. Using almost identical language, states assured the public that bridges are safe, because federal regulations require inspection of "every bridge at least once every two years." In fact, at lest 17,000 bridges in the U.S. went more than two years between safety inspections, according to federal records obtained by msnbc.com. Obtaining new records from the National Bridge Inventory under the Freedom of Information Act, bill Dedman of msnbc.com gave the public a look at inspection records through 2006. The series of articles documented several lapses in state and federal oversight bridge inspections. The interactive staff at msnbc.com created the Bridge Tracker, an interactive map of bridges, allowing readers to look at the inspection information for bridges they cross. The map shows the condition and inspection dates for more than 100,000 bridges with traffic of at least 10,000 vehicles a day.
Tags: bridge inspection; Minneapolis 35W bridge collapse; mapping; Freedom of Information Act; National Bridge Inventory; Department of Transporation
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Marshall Plant State's Top Mercury Polluter
The PPG Industries Chemical Plant in Natrium, Marshall County, "is West Virginia's largest source of mercury, a toxic metal that can poison the brain and is especially dangerous to children and developing fetuses." Reports filed with the Environmental Protection Agency reveal the plant "emit[s] more than 1,200 pounds of mercury into the air." The plant pumps salty water "through vats of pure mercury" to make chlorine and "only nine U.S. plants still use this 111-year-old process."
Tags: mercury; chlorine; toxic chemicals; chemical plants; West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection; Environmental Protection Agency; EPA; PPG Industries
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Finding Manana: A Memoir of a Cuban Exodus
Ojito relates her story of growing up in Cuba in the 1960's-70's, under Fidel Castro's government, and leaving Cuba in the 1980 Mariel boatlift when she was 16. She tells how the role of ordinary people in the boatlift managed to change the history of Cuba, South Florida and the U.S., as, she claims, President Carter partly lost the reelection because of the boatlift. She tells how although the White House attempted to deter the boatlift, Cubans came together to flee Cuba and arrive in Key West.
Tags: Fidel Castro; Cuba; Carter; Mariel; White House; Communist; Cold War; memoir
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Wring Out The Old
Never say never in the telecommunications industry. This is precisely what the young heads of QWest learnt after their manic adrenaline rush while writing off old-school US West employees and boasting of new rapid business models. Westword analyzes the full circle that QWest have come after nearly bullying over telephone company US West and firing their employees. Riding high on the stock wave soon after they took off, the new-age telecom player (QWest) were eaten up by the dotcom bust in the late '90's. Currently they face allegations of all sorts- from SEC filings to unfair pensioners policies and biased executive compensation packages.
Tags: QWest; Aeillo; US West; telecommunications; Nacchio
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Unmasking Qwest: Wired for Trouble
The Denver Post's three part series. "Part 1: The merger of Qwest and U.S. West creates culture shock as deal-driven revenue becomes king. Publicly the picture is rosy but, in private, doubts grow. Part 2: As the telecom industry crashes, Qwest unravels unable to hold off critics and investigators who question the company's accounting. Part 3: A new leader tries to restore credibility, but Qwest remains besieged by federal investigations and unhappy shareholders." Includes a timeline graphic of major events.
Tags: Qwest; U.S. West; telephone; telecommunications; telecom; accounting; federal investigation; mergers; business deals; business; spending; costs; accounting gimmicks; fraudulent accounting; Joe Nacchio
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Explaining Terrorism
The Los Angeles Times provides explanations and warnings of the terror threat to the United States published before September 11, and further explanations and insights after the attacks about the methods and nature of the terror networks behind the attacks. Major findings include: the Millennium bomb plot aroused fears of sleeping terrorism cells in the U.S.; two months before the attacks reporters documents the high level of threat from sleeper cells throughout the West; after the attack the Times identified Mohammed Atta as the leader of the plot; a major terrorist threat was exposed in Western Europe and Bosnia; tied September 11 hijackers to the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole; foretold problems for Islamic charities; detailed the warnings authorities missed prior to September 11; discovered bin Laden's extensive use of aircraft and secret U.S. fears as early as 1996 that terrorists might use crop dusters as weapons.
Tags: terrorism; September 11th; 2001; Federal Bureau of Investigation; Central Intelligence Agency; terrorism threats; terrorism in Europe; Afghanistan; Osama bin Laden; Mohammed Atta; Millennium bomb plot