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Brandeis University presents the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism
Links to Human Rights & Social Justice Reporting
- Food Justice, Food Safety
- Human Trafficking & Modern-Day Slavery
- Fraud & Corruption in International Adoptions
- Public Secrecy About Child Sexual Abuse & Freedom of Information Law
- DNA Access Law for Massachusetts Prisoners
- Sexual Harassment of Teens at Work
- Injustice in Political Asylum
- Women Veterans' Healthcare
- Justice Integrity Project
- See articles listed by topic>
Page 2
In the News
While at the Oslo Freedom Forum last week, Schuster Senior Fellow E. Benjamin Skinner was interviewed by 2Lead Leadership for Sustainability about the reality of modern-day slavery and how business could be a powerful source for reducing it.
Schuster Senior Fellow
E. Benjamin Skinner gave the keynote address at "Combating Labor Trafficking" conference on May 1, 2012. The conference was organized by the International Stability Operations Association and American Bar Association.
Schuster Founding Director Florence Graves is among 26 investigative journalists spotlighted for their investigative reporting in Charles Lewis's new project Investigating Power. Lewis, the project's executive producer, documents “great moments in journalism" and connects those moments to today's American democratic society.
Press Coverage
Slavery in your seafood
Media and industry
response to Bloomberg
article>
Other press coverage>
Appearances
May 15, 2012. Erin Siegal will speak about her book “Finding Fernanda” at the Institute of the Americas, La Jolla, Calif.
May 6-9, 2012.
E. Benjamin Skinner will introduce the panel discussion "Slavery in the Shadows" at the Oslo Freedom Forum on May 8. The panel includes leading experts on modern-day slavery Somaly Mam, Jean-Robert Cadet, Urmila Chaudhary, Kimmie Weeks, and Schuster Advisory Board member Julia Ormond speaking on various topics.
May 1, 2012.
E. Benjamin Skinner gave the keynote address at the "Combating Labor Trafficking" conference sponsored by the International Stability Operations Association and the American Bar Association, Washington, D.C.
Awards & Honors
Schuster Fellow Rebekah Cowell received a Sigma Delta Chi Award in the Newspaper Investigative Reporting (Non-Daily) category for "The Waste Land," "Living on the Edge," and "Digging Deeper," a series that investigates the municipal policies of situating dump sites near African-American and Latino neighborhoods in North Carolina.
Schuster Senior Fellow Madeline Drexler received a Sigma Delta Chi Award for Public Service in Magazine Journalism for her article "Why Your Food Isn't Safe." Drexler investigated food safety policy in America, foodborne illness, and proposed solutions for improving public health.
Schuster Fellow Erin Siegal received a James Madison Award in the author category from the Society of Professional Journalists, Northern California. This award recognizes journalists for exceptional work in support of the public's First Amendment and freedom of information rights.
Affiliations
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© 2008-2012 Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, 02454. All rights reserved.
The Front Page
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NEW Commenting on the New York Times two-part series about child sexual abuse in ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities, the Village Voice’s Nick Pinto blogged that "many were dismayed that the Times series failed to credit the work of other reporters who have been on the beat for years," including groundbreaking reporting by Schuster Institute Senior Fellow Hella Winston. |
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NEW "The Stolen Makeni Children," Schuster Institute E.J. Graff, May 11, 2012, Slate.com. |
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NEW Dogged Reporting by an Independent Journalist is a profile of Schuster's Senior Fellow Hella Winston's reporting on public secrecy about child sex abuse cases in some ultra-Orthodox communities, May 10, 2012. |
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NEW "Finding Fernanda" (Beacon Press, May 8, 2012), Schuster Senior Fellow Erin Siegal's narrative portrayal of a Guatemalan family’s struggle to reunite with their daughter, reveals fraud and corruption in international adoption between Guatemala and the United States. |
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"The Fishing Industry's Cruelest Catch," Schuster Senior Fellow E. Benjamin Skinner, February 20, 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek. For some Indonesian workers, commercial fishing in the seas off New Zealand became a nightmare of abuse aboard foreign-chartered vessels. Learn more about slavery in your seafood> |
Human Rights
& Social Justice Reporting
Human Trafficking & Modern-Day Slavery
Slavery has not ended. Today, human beings are enslaved all over the world—including in the United States. For example, they are forced to work in agriculture, fishing, gravel pits, mines, restaurants, as domestic servants, and in brothels.
"Commentary: Did slaves catch your seafood?" Sophie Elsner, April 12, 2012, GlobalPost.
"The Fishing Industry's Cruelest Catch,"
E. Benjamin Skinner, February 20, 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek. Learn more: Slavery In Your Seafood
"How U.S. Budget Cuts Prolong Global Slavery," E. Benjamin Skinner, June 28, 2011, Time.com.
"A Decade of Anti-Trafficking Legislation: Looking Back and Moving Forward," Sophie Elsner, June 26, 2011, Huffington Post.
Need to Know on PBS interview with E. Benjamin Skinner on modern-day slavery, June 17, 2011.
"Britain's Long Fight Against Slavery," E. Benjamin Skinner, Huffington Post, May 2, 2011.
More about human trafficking and modern-day slavery>Food Justice, Food Safety
"Dining With Dioxin," Karen Coates, March 7, 2012, The Faster Times.
Schuster Senior Fellow Karen Coates recalls dining in Laos and considers the longterm ramifications of the American bombing campaign during the Vietnam war on farmlands and public health.Photos by Schuster Senior Fellow Jerry Redfern.
Good Food Should Not Be A Luxury, with excerpts from Schuster Senior Fellow Tracie McMillan's new book "The American Way of Eating." Press coverage | Statement following Rush Limbaugh's attack against McMillan and her book.
“Why Your Food Isn’t Safe,” Madeline Drexler, October 2011, Good Housekeeping.
Each year, contaminated food sends an estimated 128,000 victims to the hospital, and it kills some 3,000 children and adults.
Learn more about foodborne illness and food safety policy:
- Food safety: An overview
- Common foodborne germs
- People who have fallen victim to foodborne illness
- Food safety: A historical look
- Who monitors our food?
- Non-O157 E. Coli: The growing threat
- The food safety budget is starved
- How to fix the food safety system
- Resources for learning more and how to stay informed
Fraud & Corruption in International Adoptions
"NEW Finding Fernanda: Two Mothers, One Child, and a Cross-Border Search for the Truth," Erin Siegal, Beacon Press, May 8, 2012.
Siegal does a fantastic job of breaking down a complicated story, and gives voice to the distinct players involved in Guatemalan children being adopted by US families. “Finding Fernanda” is a gripping read that offers glimpses of hope in what was an otherwise heartbreaking system.
—The Christian Science Monitor,
November 28, 2011
"Mexico Adoption Bust Reveals Vast Child Trafficking Ring," Erin Siegal, February 29, 2012, Huffington Post.
Adoption Illegalities in Guatemala: What the U.S. Government Knew, and What Was Said and Done, with excerpts from Erin Siegal's new book "the U.S. Embassy Cables: Adoption Fraud in Guatemala, 1987-2010."
Asociación Primavera Lawyer and Director Found Guilty of Human Trafficking in Karen Abigail Case, Timothy and Jennifer Monihan Appear on TV, October 24, 2011, Erin Siegal.
Guatemala Court Revokes Passport, Asks for Return of Child "Karen Abigail."
As part of her extensive investigation of international adoption in Guatemala, Schuster Institute Fellow Erin Siegal reports on the sad and complicated drama of the Guatemalan child, Anyelí Liseth Hernández Rodríguez, allegedly kidnapped in November 3, 2006, and then in 2007, placed with American parents in Missouri. Also at Huffington Post.
"The Makeni Children," August 9, 2011, Slate.com.
In a riveting three-part series, Schuster Senior Fellow E.J. Graff investigates the adoption of two children from Sierra Leone, whose American families learned—13 years after the adoption—that birth families were looking for their children.
NEW "The Stolen Makeni Children," E.J. Graff, May 11, 2012, Slate.com.
- Part I: In 1998, Americans Adopted 29 Children From a Town in Sierra Leone. Their Birth Families Say They Were Stolen
- Part II: That Was the Last Time We Ever Saw These Children
- Part III: How Flawed is the International Adoption Process?
More about fraud and corruption in international adoption>
Public Secrecy About Child Sexual Abuse
For four years Schuster Senior Fellow Hella Winston’s reporting in The New York Jewish Week kept alive the issue of child sexual abuse in ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities. Read Winston's reports>
DNA Access Law for Massachusetts Prisoners
"Failing the Test," Michael Blanding and Lindsay Markel, November 20, 2011, The Boston Globe Magazine.
Schuster Senior Fellow Michael Blanding and Assistant Director Lindsay Markel teamed with the Boston Globe Magazine to investigate why, at the time, Massachusetts was one of only two states without a DNA access bill, and what that means for prisoners who claim that DNA testing will help prove their innocence. Since the publication of "Failing the Test," Massachusetts has passed the DNA access bill into law. Read more>
More about DNA access, the causes of wrongful conviction, and the Justice Brandeis Innocence Project>
Injustice in Political Asylum
Broken Promises: Seeking Political Asylum in America," Ladies Home Journal, April 2010.
Torture survivors and rape victims seeking political asylum are locked up alongside hardened criminals in U.S. prisons, where they often remain for months, even years.
This article by Senior Fellow Jan Goodwin is the winner of three journalism awards.
More investigative articles by Jan Goodwin>
Women Veterans' Healthcare
"The VA Health-Care System's Dishonorable Conduct," Good Housekeeping, March 2010.
Schuster Institute Senior Fellow Jan Goodwin investigated and wrote about serious failings in the Veterans Administration’s healthcare offerings for female veterans. Within months of the publication of both Goodwin’s investigation and a related Government Accountability Office report, the following events occurred:
The Association for Women in Communications honored this article with a 2011 Clarion Award.
- Veterans Affairs to Ease Claim Process for Stress Disorder, The New York Times.
- Landmark Health Care Bill for Female Veterans, May 5, 2010. President Obama signed into law the Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act of 2010, a landmark bill that will bolster care for female veterans.
More investigative articles by Jan Goodwin>
Justice Integrity Project
The Justice Integrity Project is a project of Schuster Institute's Senior Fellow Andrew Kreig. The "focus of the Justice Integrity Project is to promote effective oversight of federal prosecution and judicial misconduct" by way of educating the "public and its opinion-leaders" and working with "legal officials, organizations, and voters to increase awareness of how federal injustice harms the country."
Recent posts from the Justice Integrity Project:
Former NSA Analyst, Secret Service Officer Speaks Out On Scandals
'Liberal' California Courts Block Obama's Totalitarian Power Grab
More investigative articles by Andrew Kreig>
Sexual Harassment of Teens at Work
Few people understand how aggressive and hostile sexual harassment can be. And few teens are adequately prepared or instructed about how to face it at their after-school, weekend, or summer jobs.
"Summer Jobs Often Lead to Harassment," ABC's WCVB-TV, July 10, 2009.
"Is Your Daughter Safe at Work?" PBS Now/Schuster Institute, Feb. 20, 2009.
“Is Your Daughter Safe at Work?” Good Housekeeping, July 2007.
More about sexual harassment of teenagers in the workplace>
