for a package of text, photos, interactive and video that showed the final week of the Cassini spacecraft at Saturn, after a nearly 20-year journey. http://bit.ly/2hi3al4 http://bit.ly/2xnT1sC
for reporting that toxic algae has evolved from a local waterway nuisance to a serious nationwide hazard, even as the government has spent billions of taxpayer dollars on largely ineffective measures to prevent farm fertilizer runoff, a primary cause of the environmental plague.https://www.apnews.com/tag/AwashinAlgaehttp://bit.ly/2hNEkXr
For three months, Associated Press photographer Jae Hong traveled Americaâs West Coast to chronicle the regionâs exploding homeless crisis and do what many try to avoid: look into the eyes of the people living on the streets, in tents or in their vehicles and get to know them.
His series of intimate portraits focused on the subjectsâ eyes and were combined with short text stories to reveal their humanity, whether it was an aging, down-on-his-luck street performer on Los Angelesâ Skid Row or a 9-year-old boy who lives with his family in a rented RV blocks from Googleâs headquarters.
The unique portraits were one part of a larger package of images that Hong and his colleagues across the West â Ted Warren, Marcio Sanchez, Chris Carlson and Greg Bull â produced for a project looking at the roots of the homeless crisis in the region and identifying potential solutions.
For their work documenting the lives of the homeless, the team wins this weekâs Beat of the Week prize.
for their sensitive and detailed reporting in all formats on the sexual torture, branding and beatings of 52 Tamil men seeking asylum in Europe after fleeing Sri Lanka.http://bit.ly/2zNrvErhttps://www.apnews.com/tag/BrandedandBeaten
âHi,â the email from Google began, before turning more ominous. âSomeone just used your password to try to sign in to your Google Account.â Change your password immediately, it urged, by clicking here. But the email wasnât actually from Google, and it wasnât sent randomly. It was from hackers connected to Russia who were targeting Hillary Clintonâs presidential campaign.
What eventually emerged from the successful hack â thousands of embarrassing emails from campaign chairman John Podesta and others â was widely reported in the summer and fall of 2016. But the anatomy of how that hack occurred had never been revealed, until now. That investigative story, by Raphael Satter, Justin Myers, Jeff Donn and Chad Day, and a companion piece about wider Russian efforts targeting an array of Kremlin opponents, is this weekâs Beat of the Week.
for leveraging APâs global reach to tell a compelling, all-formats story about a German woman's apology to a New Jersey man, decades after her family took his family's home after they fled Nazi Germany. https://apnews.com/f29365787da147f28ba2a06c7496599...
for their all-formats coverage that documented how millions in Brazil, once a model of poverty eradication, were going back into extreme poverty. https://apnews.com/89afd8d964984eb69678129e7d4a16c...
It was just one of the many mysteries surrounding the Las Vegas concert shooting: How did the gunman, perched up on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay resort, fire off as many as 90 rounds onto thousands of concert-goers in just 10 seconds, killing 58 people and injuring hundreds?
Reporters Sadie Gurman and Mike Balsamo found the answer. Through sourcework, they learned that Stephen Paddock was able to carry out his assault in moments because he had used two âbump stocks,â devices that allow a semi-automatic rifle to repeatedly fire like a machine gun.
The scoop was part of an impressive week of coverage by staff in the Las Vegas bureau and across the AP that also included photographer John Locherâs dramatic images of police screaming for people to take cover as the gunman sprayed the crowd with bullets.
For their work in bringing critical details and images of the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history, Gurman, Balsamo and Locher win this weekâs Beat of the Week prize.
First, a 7.1 magnitude earthquake rocked Mexico, killing hundreds. Then, a day later, a category 4 hurricane pummeled Puerto Rico, leaving millions of people without power and with little water.
Two major calamities, one sterling response: Staffers of The Associated Press went to heroic lengths to tell the world the stories of two places battered by disaster. Their efforts were led to extraordinary achievements â in text, photos and video â and the Beat of the Week.
While books and movies have shed light on the world of big-time amateur basketball, no one has published stories along the way â until now. With the first story in a series, Detroit sportswriter Larry Lage and others in a team from Sports established AP as the authority on news about Emoni Bates, a 13-year-old who stands at 6-foot-7, just started the eighth grade and is primed to be the biggest basketball prospect in the United States. The goal is to understand the high-pressure world of college basketball recruiting by following a single promising playerâs path.
Lage, hybrid video journalist Mike Householder and photographer Paul Sancya of Detroit reported with the specific intent of presenting the stories in multiple ways, then worked with Chicago sports writer Jim Litke and east regional sports editor Oskar Garcia to craft the hub presentation of the text, photos, video and audio.
For their strong, revealing work, Lage, Householder, Sancya and Litke share this weekâs Best of the States prize.
for a joint investigation by the AP and USA TODAY Network that found accidental shootings involving young children often go unpunished, even when adults recklessly store loaded guns within easy reach. http://apne.ws/2rAJ9JO http://apne.ws/2qWZiGV http://apne.ws/2qX4ydz http://apne.ws/2qhlBpw
Shootings in Chicago have captured national headlines, and for good reason: The city has among the highest rates of teenage gun violence in the nation. But where else in the U.S. are teenagers most likely to be killed or injured by gunfire? Baltimore, Detroit, Los Angeles?
In an exclusive analysis, journalists from the AP, working jointly with the USA Today Network, arrived at an unexpected answer: Except for Chicago, the places with the highest rates of teen gun violence in America are smaller and mid-sized cities â towns like Wilmington, Delaware, population 72,000.
AP data journalists Meghan Hoyer and Larry Fenn led the analysis of 3½ yearsâ worth of shooting cases provided by the nonprofit Gun Violence Archive. Baltimore reporter Juliet Linderman, with significant assists from Albany reporter Michael Hill and Savannah correspondent Russ Bynum, picked it up from there. Video journalist Allen Breed produced a powerful video that illustrates the danger and despair, along with the difficulties that WIlmington is having in addressing the problems. The package also was enhanced with graphics from interactives producer Maureen Linke.
For their work revealing a surprising side of teenage gun violence in America, state reporters Linderman, Bynum and Hill, video journalist Breed, data journalists Hoyer and Fenn, and graphic artist Linke share this weekâs Best of the States award.
Hurricane Harvey inundated homes, flooded freeways and swamped entire neighborhoods. Florida-based reporter Jason Dearen, who was deployed to Houston to help cover the disaster, knew there might be something else submerged beneath the turbid floodwaters. Superfund sites, some of the nationâs most contaminated places, are scattered along the low-lying Gulf coastline, including in the Houston area.
Dearen had been trying to obtain a copy of a federal study about the risks of flooding at those sites from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, but had been stonewalled for two weeks. Harveyâs destruction provided new urgency to his request. For help, he reached out to Washington investigative reporter Michael Biesecker, a fellow member of the APâs environmental beat team.
Through creative reporting that relied on data, collaboration and Dearenâs newfound skills as a boat man, they became the first journalists to report on the extent of flooding at contaminated waste sites in and around Houston. The on-site observations by Dearen and freelance 360-video producer Claudia Prat raised concerns that some of the decades-old toxic stew left over from the oil, gas and chemical industries may have mixed with floodwaters. They also were on the ground â and on the water â before the EPAâs own inspectors. For their efforts, Dearen, Biesecker and Prat win Beat of the Week.
By the time the moon began to block the sun for millions of Americans on August 21, Marcia Dunn, Seth Borenstein, Gillian Flaccus, Marshall Ritzel and many others across the AP had told the world just about everything there was to know about the event with a series of text stories, photos, videos and animations organized and coordinated by Stephanie Nano and Raghu Vadarevu. Stories included what scientists were hoping to learn, what ancient peoples thought of eclipses, how to protect your eyes, how eclipses work, how businesses were taking advantage of the big day, and more.
For leading the effort on a sparkling package that made full use of the APâs national reach and expertise in all formats to explore a story of enormous national interest, this weekâs $300 Best of the States prize is shared by Dunn, Borenstein, Flaccus and Ritzel.
for a dozen vibrantly illustrated dispatches and a two-part series documenting the impact that a dramatic decline in sea ice has had on the environment, wildlife and people in the Arctic Circleâs Northwest Passage. https://www.apnews.com/tag/NewArctic
Itâs well-known that many U.S. factory jobs have been shipped overseas or automated out of existence. Whatâs not so well-known is that American manufacturing is no longer shrinking. Factories have actually added nearly a million jobs in the past seven years.
But the jobs have changed: The new ones generally require advanced education, technological know-how or specialized skills to survive in what are now highly automated workplaces. Yet training opportunities are limited, particularly for older workers.
Cincinnati correspondent Dan Sewell and photographer John Minchillo pinpointed this uneasy mix in southwestern Ohio and proposed an immersive multimedia story to illuminate the trend for readers and viewers. Collaborating with Washington business writer Chris Rugaber, video-first reporter Mike Householder and others, they produced a multifaceted package that made full use of the APâs global reach, earning this weekâs Best of the States prize.
Paul J. Weber, newsperson, Austin, and Eric Gay, photogapher, San Antonio, Texas, for documenting Texasâ quiet but sweeping funding cuts to the 2,300 impoverished border communities known as âcolonias,â and including 360-degree video. http://abcn.ws/2wMSFbI
Wilson Ring, correspondent, Montpelier, Vermont; David Martin, videographer, New York City, and Charlie Krupa, photographer, Boston, for reporting on migrants flooding Canada from a remote outpost. https://tinyurl.com/yahs47rz
After the U.S. Supreme Court told states that juveniles who had been given mandatory life without parole sentences should get the chance to argue for their release, national writers Sharon Cohen and Adam Geller wanted to know how judges, prosecutors, lawmakers and parole boards were dealing with the inmates.
Aided by reporters in all 50 states, their exhaustive investigation showed for the first time that the high courtâs mandate in 2016 to give inmates a chance at freedom is being applied inconsistently, varying from state to state, even county to county, âin a pattern that can make justice seem arbitrary.â
The resulting three-day series featured deeply reported text stories, an expansive photo report of inmates from across the country, a 16-minute audio extra, a video animation on teen brain development, a video story, and a searchable trove of state-by-state details â all hosted in a dynamic hub on APNews.com.
Cohen and Gellerâs work wins this weekâs Beat of the Week prize.
"They kept us as slaves."
One man's tearful revelation to AP national investigative reporter Mitch Weiss helped unravel a horrible secret â the former congregant of the World of Faith Fellowship sect was among hundreds who'd been dispatched from the church's two Brazilian branches to the U.S., where many say they were forced to work for little or no pay and physically or verbally assaulted.
Dozens of former congregants told similar stories of abuse and exploitation in an exclusive AP multi-format story that earns Weiss, national investigative reporter Holbrook Mohr, and Peter Prengaman, news director in Rio de Janeiro, the Beat of the Week.
