My investigation “Destroyed” uncovered that police nationwide trashed rape kits – most never tested for DNA – in at least 400 sex crime cases before the statutes of limitations expired or when there was no time limit to prosecute. The destruction followed flawed and incomplete investigations and, in some cases, violated the law.
Read MoreAdvocates for sexual assault survivors have long reported stories of hospitals turning away victims who are then forced to make hours-long trips in rural areas for treatment – if they make the trips at all. As a result, survivors and their efforts to seek criminal prosecution suffer.
Read MoreWhile the physical and emotional toll of rape is enormous, so, too, are the financial costs. I spoke with survivors who, because of their attacks, lost days from work, or found themselves unable to work again. Some described how their rape led them to drop out of college, setting them back years in pursuing their education and delaying their entry into the workforce. Others had to relocate after being assaulted in their homes.
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Pulitzer-winning reporter Sally Kestin and I collaborated on this quintessential shoe-leather story that required us to dig some 35 years in the past to uncover a powerful charity leader’s hidden sex crime conviction. We methodically tracked down Bill Murdock’s victim – combing through yearbooks, talking to classmates, tracking down retired teachers – and helped her tell her story for the first time. We also dug into the charity leader’s claims of awards which we discovered were bogus or exaggerated. From tip to publication, this story took six weeks.
Read MoreVictoria Sanford and other interviewers of war crime victims absorb what psychiatrists call secondary trauma. A better word, perhaps, is found in the Mayan culture. "Susto" is what the women Sanford was interviewing called it when they noticed her struggling. She had "fright sickness.”
Read MoreThis investigation began with a tip from a South Florida source that a Broward County school teacher who had been convicted of sexually molesting a seventh-grade student had convinced a judge to let him avoid going to prison. The sex offender then moved not far from his victim’s home. I uncovered that the judge erred in granting this arrangement – there had been no legal precedent for it -- and the Broward Sheriff’s Office, charged with monitoring the sex offender’s whereabouts, appeared to have no record of where he was at times.
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