. Five years ago, a tragedy occurred in American journalism: Investigative reporter Gary Webb - who had been ostracized by his own colleagues for forcing a spotlight back onto an ugly government scandal they wanted to ignore - was driven to commit suicide. 71K views 8 years ago Gary Webb's son Ian talks about the film in which Jeremy Renner plays his late journalist father. When facts didn't fit his theory, he tended to shove them to the sidelines. "[74] Mary Anne Sharkey, Webb's editor at The Plain Dealer, told writer Alicia Shepard in 1997 that Webb was known as 'the carpenter' "because he had everything nailed down. Shortly before his death, his motorcycle had been stolen (it was recovered by his family after his death). Webb had become, as somebody put it, "radioactive". Going to the CIA to ask if they've ever profited from drug sales in Los Angeles, I suggested to Kornbluh, is rather like asking Fagin if he has ever picked a pocket. But the biggest loss he had was the writing. He died on December 10, 2004 in Carmichael, California, USA. [52] Webb was allowed to keep working on the story and made one more trip to Nicaragua in March. Ross was also released early after cooperating in an investigation of police corruption, but was rearrested a few months later in a sting operation arranged with Blandn's help. By the autumn of 1997, on medication for clinical depression, he was given leave of absence from the paper. Osborn, Barbara Bliss (MarchApril 1998). When she got indignant," she adds, "he went to meet her.". For instance, he published an article on racial profiling in traffic stops in Esquire magazine, in April 1999. He had sold his house the week before his death because he was unable to afford the mortgage.[71]. But ultimately, the responsibility was, and is, mine.". Webb's pieces were not dealing with nameless peasants slaughtered in some distant republic, but demonstrated a clear link between the CIA and the suppliers of the gangs delivering crack to the ghetto of Watts, in South Central Los Angeles. There is a CIA connection and I can demonstrate it.'". Nick Schou, a journalist who wrote a 2006 biography of Webb, has claimed that this was the most important error in the series. Tomac is used to good feelings when it comes to Daytona. padding:0!important; Gary Webb was born on August 31, 1955 in Corona, California, USA. The Warning in Gary Webb's Death - Consortium News "Looking back," she says, "I think Gary had been obsessed with suicide for some time. I felt weak and distressed; the whole thing was so fresh. He was sentenced to life in prison, though the sentence was shortened on appeal and Ross was released in 2009. Work with a bunch of drug dealers to run guns? The Mercury News reporter came under sustained attack from the weightier US newspapers such as The New York Times, The Washington Post and, especially, the Los Angeles Times, infuriated at being scooped, on its own patch, by what it saw as a small-town paper. [71] "The way he was acting it would be hard for me to believe it was anything but suicide," she said. .article-native-ad svg { He was previously married to Sue Bell. He began his career working for newspapers in Kentucky and Ohio, winning numerous awards, and building a strong reputation for investigative writing. When Attorney General Janet Reno determined that a delay was no longer necessary, the report was released unaltered. When I first heard the news, I tell Bell, I was inclined to believe the conspiracy theories that still proliferate on the internet, suggesting that Webb had been assassinated - either by one of the drug dealers he'd met while writing Dark Alliance, or by the intelligence services who were supposed to police them. LOS ANGELES, Dec. 12 - Gary Webb, a reporter who won national attention with a series of articles, later discredited, linking the Central Intelligence Agency to the spread of crack . "He told the guys with him he was fine," she recalls, "got back on the bike, then passed out, half an hour later. Occupation: Machine Operators, Assemblers, and Inspectors Occupations. Dark Alliance: Gary Webb, Christian Rummel: 9781522694397: Amazon.com Walter Bogdanich, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who worked with Webb on The Plain Dealer, told American Journalism Review editor Susan Paterno "He was brilliant; he knew more about public records than anybody I've ever known. The "Dark Alliance" series remains controversial. E&P Staff. And he finallyyou know, they finally left the country. The second volume, "The Contra Story," was issued in a classified version on April 27, 1998, and in an unclassified version on October 8, 1998. ", Many of these are in the series archive at. Emma Lee Webb. The third article discussed the social effects of the crack trade, noting that it had a disparate effect on African-Americans. By Sam Stanton Bee Staff Writer Published 2:15 am PST Wednesday, December 15, 2004. . "Although Ross had become a millionaire by 1984," Katz now wrote, "the market was so huge by then that even a dealer of his stature could seem dwarfed How the crack epidemic reached that extreme, on some level," he continues, "had nothing to do with Ross". . He received his medical degree from American University of the Caribbean School of Medicine and has been in practice for more than. At that time, Webb (pictured) was best known for the controversial three-part CIA 1996 expose he wrote the San Jose Mercury News called "Dark Alliance: The Story Behind the . Both Gary's ex-wife Susan and his brother Kurt viewed the body and they confirmed the location of the wounds to me when I met them. Gary Webb, 64, Oroville, Wash., died Oct. 30, 2021. .article-native-ad strong { margin-top: 10px; An editorial in the Times, while criticizing the series for making "unsubstantiated charges", conceded that it did find "drug-smuggling and dealing by Nicaraguans with at least tentative connections to the Contras" and called for further investigation. Evidence Begins To Indicate Gary Webb Was Murdered - BSNEWS Join iconic brands and world-class marketing leaders at Brandweek to unlock powerful insights and impact-driven strategies. Even 10 years after his tragic death, the media refuse to let him rest. [57], The report covered actions by Department of Justice employees in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the DEA, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and U.S. * The agency's response was to try to prevent him from getting his doctorate, then block his advancement in the academic world. Vivian Corrie, a part of his liver in a life-threatening operation. The article suggested this was in retribution for Ross' testimony in the corruption case. Gary Webb, Into the Buzzsaw, CH 13, Prometheus Books. Jack Blum, who was the lead investigator for Senator John Kerry's Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics and International Operations, which produced a highly damning 1989 report on drug-smuggling in the guise of national security, is one of several commentators to have questioned aspects of Webb's original reporting. The claim that the drug ring of Meneses-Blandn-Ross sparked the "crack explosion" has been perhaps the most criticized part of the series. [21] This artwork proved controversial, and The Mercury News later removed it. He became an investigator for the California State Legislature, published a book based on the "Dark Alliance" series in 1998, and did freelance investigative reporting. Save 50% with early-bird passes. [16] As part of The Mercury News team that covered the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, Webb and his colleague Pete Carey wrote a story examining the causes of the collapse of the Cypress Street Viaduct. [7] After transferring to Northern Kentucky, he entered its journalism program and wrote for the school paper, The Northerner. Blandn and Meneses' high-volume supply of low-priced high-purity cocaine "allowed Ross to sew up the Los Angeles market and move on. Pictured as a teenage fan: Gary Numan with Gemma, his now wife, getting his autograph in 1985 years before they got together Gary was 600,000 in debt, and on the verge of going under in. He accepted Christ at an early age. "It was like someone had made a terrible noise, or a terrible smell, in a small room," recalls Jonathan Winer, Kerry's chief senate staff investigator . The CIA Inspector-General's report was issued in two volumes. The first shot went through his face, and exited at his left cheek. Like Schou, Corn cites the inspector general's report, which he says "acknowledged that the CIA had indeed worked with suspected drugrunners (sic) while supporting the contras. The complete lack of desire to ask the difficult questions makes me want to scream. Eli Tomac on track during Media Day at Daytona International Speedway, Friday, March 3, 2023. "But Gary thought that if something was true, it should be told. On the last day Webb was alive, his motorbike broke down while he was moving to his mother's house. Gary Webb, MD, FRCPC, FACC - The Donohue Funeral Homes Inc. We had this huge team of people at the L.A. Times and kind of piled on to one lone muckraker up in Northern California." But his central thesis - that the CIA, having participated in narcotics trafficking in central America, had, at best, turned a blind eye to the activities of drug dealers in LA - has never been in question. Webb's reports prompted three official investigations, including one by the CIA itself which - astonishingly for an organisation rarely praised for its transparency - confirmed the substance of his findings (published at length in Webb's 1998 book, also entitled Dark Alliance). Moreira - a senior news producer for Canal Plus - has established a reputation for courage and independence of mind in his own foreign reporting, and was recently described by Le Monde as "the Che Guevara of news media". There was no coffin, casket or tombstone. Jeff Leen, assistant managing editor for investigative reporting at The Washington Post, wrote in a 2014 opinion page article that "the report found no CIA relationship with the drug ring Webb had written about." [39] Carey's critique appeared in mid-October and went through several of the Post's criticisms of the series, including the importance of Blandn's drug ring in spreading crack, questions about Blandn's testimony in court, and how specific series allegations about CIA involvement had been, giving Webb's responses. Actor Jeremy Renner portrays Webb.[83]. "If there was an eye to the storm," Katz wrote, "if there was a mastermind behind crack's decade-long reign, if there was one outlaw most responsible for flooding LA's streets with mass-marketed cocaine, his name was Freeway Rick. [72] A New York Times profile of Webb in June 1997 noted that two of his series written for the Cleveland Plain Dealer had resulted in lawsuits that the paper had settled. He stayed home, playing computer games, and began smoking cannabis heavily. "But that," pointed out Blum, who is now a Washington attorney, "in no way - in no way - diminishes the wrongness of what these bastards did. Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, Extra 20% off selected fashion and sportswear at Very, Up to 20% off & extra perks with Booking.com Genius Membership, $6 off a $50+ order with this AliExpress discount code, 10% off selected orders over 100 - eBay discount code, Compare broadband packages side by side to find the best deal for you, Compare cheap broadband deals from providers with fastest speed in your area, All you need to know about fibre broadband, Best Apple iPhone Deals in the UK March 2023, Compare iPhone contract deals and get the best offer this March, Compare the best mobile phone deals from the top networks and brands. WRITTEN IN PAIN - Los Angeles Times [5], After high school, Webb attended an Indianapolis community college on a scholarship until his family moved to Cincinnati. After examining the investigations and prosecutions of the main figures in the series, Blandn, Meneses and Ross, it concluded that "Although the investigations suffered from various problems of communication and coordination, their successes and failures were determined by the normal dynamics that affect the success of scores of investigations of high-level drug traffickers These factors, rather than anything as spectacular as a systematic effort by the CIA or any other intelligence agency to protect the drug trafficking activities of Contra supporters, determined what occurred in the cases we examined. Gary's family found that old, storied, ("priceless to us," as his ex-wife, Susan Bell, described it to me) CDROM among his possessions. He went into the bedroom, and picked up a .38 that had belonged to his father. Sheriff: Fatal Blue Grass house fire rule 'undetermined, but accidental' California senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein also took note and wrote to CIA director John Deutch and Attorney General Janet Reno, asking for investigations into the articles' allegations. [63]Dark Alliance was a 1998 Pen/Newman's Own First Amendment Award Finalist, 1998 San Francisco Chronicle bestseller, 1999 Bay Area Book Reviewers Award Finalist, and 1999 Firecracker Alternative Booksellers Award Winner in the Politics category. This support "was not directed by anyone within the Contra movement who had an association with the CIA," and the Committee found "no evidence that the CIA or the Intelligence Community was aware of these individuals support. Gary Webb Obituary (1954 - 2021) - Dorr, MI - Grand Rapids Press In February, Gary Webb gave his ex-wife. [36] McManus wrote that Blandn's and Meneses's contributions to Contra organizations were significantly less than the "millions" claimed in the series, and stated there was no evidence that the CIA had tried to protect them.