Computer-assisted Investigative Reporting

Development and Methodology

Margaret H. DeFleur

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781136686351
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Langues et linguistique
• Subtopic: Études sur la communication

Conducting computer analyses for the purposes of revealing information of significance to the press represents an extension of one of the most important forms of American journalism into the contemporary era of new technologies. Investigative reporting had its start with the establishment of the metropolitan newspaper during the early decades of the 1900s. At the time, it was a continuation of the evolving tradition of freedom of the press that had characterized American political life since colonial times. As it developed, investigative reporting stressed facts rather than the opinions of the editor or reporter. In turn, that tradition had its own intellectual roots. Today, computer-assisted investigative reporting (CAIR) extends that "marketplace of ideas" into systematic examinations of the electronic records of government. In addition, computer analyses of other kinds of information systematically gathered by journalists can provide the press with insights into trends and patterns unlikely to be revealed by other means. This unique volume addresses procedures and issues in investigative journalism that have not been explained in other publications. It sets forth -- for the first time -- a detailed and specific methodology for conducting computer-assisted investigative analyses of both large and small scale electronic records of government and other agencies. That methodology consists of the logic of inquiry, strategies for reaching valid conclusions, and rules for reporting what has been revealed by the analyses to the public in clear ways. Such systematic methodologies are essential in social and other sciences and the development of a counterpart for investigative journalism has been badly needed. That systematic methodology is developed within a context that explains the origin and major characteristics of those elements that have come together in American society to make computer-assisted investigative reporting both possible and increasingly a part of standard newsroom practices. These include the development of traditional investigative journalism, the evolution of computer technology, the use of computers by government to keep records, the legal evolution of freedom of information laws, the rapid adoption of computers in newsrooms, the increasing importance of precision journalism, and the sharp increase in recent times of computer-assisted investigative reporting by American newspapers both large and small. The issues addressed in this book are discussed in a very readable context with an abundance of examples and illustrations drawn from the real world of journalism as it is practiced daily in newsrooms around the country. Explanations of concepts, principles, and procedures are set forth in layperson's terms that require very little in the way of knowledge of computers or statistical methods.

1
From Bordello to Watergate and Beyond: The Changing Nature of Investigative Reporting

Representative government cannot exist and cannot even be theoretically conceived unless provision is made for the governed to know what their governors are doing, are not doing and are contemplating doing.

—Louis W. Hodges, Mass Communication Review, 1987

Since a reporter was first hired by Benjamin Day in 1833 to write interesting stories about what happened in the morning police court for his New York Sun, the work of American journalists has continued to change. As this book discusses, reporters are changing the way in which they conduct their investigations perhaps more rapidly today than at any point during the last two centuries. In particular, the Computer Age, into which we continue to rush headlong, has brought new challenges to journalists. That has been especially true for investigative reporters, who seek to uncover objective facts about situations that are of importance and interest to the public. In their capacities as "watchdogs" of the public interest, they constantly try to exercise oversight on the functioning of government agencies, the performance of public officials, and other kinds of situations about which they feel the public has a right to know. It is a critical service to our democratic society and investigative reporters are the channel by which objective assessments of the functioning of public institutions, mismanagement, or even wrongdoing are routinely disclosed to the public.

Investigative reporting in the United States has a rich and remarkable history. It developed in ways that may have been impossible in other societies, where different values prevailed concerning the rights of those governed to have access to accurate and detailed information about the performance of their public institutions. The role of the press as a "fourth estate" was defined during the 18th century in many societies. However, as this chapter shows, the idea developed in the United States with special vigor.

Beginning in the 19th century, the investigative reporter became an important figure in the United States, admired by the public for persistence, audacity, and dedication to the cause of democracy. Indeed, by the middle of the 20th century, investigative reporting had emerged as an adventurous, even glamorous, role within the labor force of journalism. Although it was mainly a function performed by newspaper journalists, important contributions had been made by magazine writers, novelists, and, later, reporters working within the broadcast industries.

By the end of World War II, the techniques used were well understood. Investigative reporting was based on interviews with various kinds of officials and other figures, tips gained from informants, documents that were either leaked or otherwise tracked down in government files, plus a great deal of insight, inductive reasoning, and sometimes just plain luck. It was, as some have said, a "shoe leather" operation, where the investigator spent a great deal of time tracking down information in a variety of places from a variety of people.

Then, beginning in the late 1960s and accelerating during the 1970s, a significant change began to take place in the nature of investigative reporting. While traditional procedures, strategies and "shoe leather" approaches remained important, something new was added. By the late 1980s, a new approach to journalism emerged. It not only made use of traditional "shoe leather" procedures for identifying leads, finding cooperating informants, tracking down relevant paper documents, and interviewing officials, but it also required the use of new and sophisticated technologies. The new procedures required reporters to obtain electronic records on magnetic tape, to use mainframe and desktop computers, and to analyze databases of information. One name for the new approach was computer-assisted investigative reporting—referred to by the acronym CAIR in this book.

Investigative Reporting in a Changing Technological Environment

To provide an illustration of CAIR as a new frontier of investigative reporting, a brief summary of a rather dramatic project is presented in the following paragraphs. It indicates how computer technology has become important in the task of the contemporary "watchdog" of the public interest. This case history of a CAIR project also shows how the more traditional approach and the newer technologies have merged.

While working on a story about subsidized housing for the Providence Journal, investigative reporter Elliot Jaspin met the executive director of the Rhode Island Housing and Mortgage Finance Corporation (RIHMFC). Jaspin learned that this agency sold tax-free municipal bonds and used the proceeds to provide more than 30,000 mortgages for Rhode Island families with low and moderate incomes. The program loaned money for the mortgages at relatively low interest rates to these families of limited means so that they could purchase modest homes. At a time when conventional mortgage rates were running as high as 19%, these families had been squeezed out of the housing market. The below-market rates of the RIHMFC mortgages made them a great bargain and competition to get such a loan was intense.

During a local election campaign in 1985, Jaspin received a phone call from an anonymous tipster who suggested that something was amiss in this state agency. In addition, another Journal reporter, Kathy Gregg, received a phone call from an individual who claimed that one of the candidates in the election had a home financed by RIHMFC, but did not actually live in the house. If true, this would be a clear violation of the conditions for receiving the low-interest money. A short time later, Gregg heard from still another anonymous caller, who said the other candidate in the election had two RIHMFC loans, even though the rules stated that only one such loan could be obtained by a person. Furthermore, the rules stated that only first-time home buyers were eligible. Both of these provisions would rule out having two homes financed by the fund.

Jaspin and Gregg decided that if these claims were true, there just might be something "fishy" going on at RIHMFC. With the backing of their newspaper, they decided to take a closer look at the agency to try and determine just who it was that had benefited from the pool of low-interest money.¹

The first step was to interview the executive director of the agency. He readily admitted that one of the candidates had received two mortgages, but claimed that this was not a problem because the candidate was selling the first home while moving into the second one. And, yes, the agency did sometimes give mortgages to people who were not first-time home buyers. However, because of privacy concerns, the director would not reveal who else had received a loan as a result of this unannounced "special" policy.

By this time, the reporters' suspicions were really aroused and they asked to see the agency's records. They knew, of course, that it would take an incredibly long time to go through the paper records of all of the 30,000 mortgages that the agency had approved. The reporters were aware, however, that all information about each of the low-interest mortgages was also recorded on a computer tape by RIHMFC. The reporters asked for a copy of the tape. However, their request was immediately denied. They were referred to the agency's attorney, who refused to provide the tape on the grounds that the people holding the mortgages had a right to privacy in their personal financial affairs.

At this point, the newspaper filed suit against the agency under the information access laws of Rhode Island, which gave citizens a right to examine public records. The reporters demanded a copy of the electronic records on the grounds that RIHMFC was a state agency, that the tape was a public record under the law, and that they had a right, as did any citizen, to examine what information they contained.

Meanwhile, an individual who worked in the agency claimed that the director was worried about what would show up on the tape if the newspaper won its court case. In fact, the head of the agency had ordered an employee to begin deleting certain records from the tape. When the Rhode Island Attorney General's office learned about this, the State Police were authorized to seize the records. The newspaper later won the court case and a copy of the computer tape was delivered to the newspaper.

Jaspin immediately went to work deciphering the information that the tape contained. He determined that at least 1,140 records were missing from the computer tape. He also discovered that some of the missing records were from an earlier loan program that had been kept open, even though the public had been told that it was closed. Ultimately, the reporters learned that the money from this earlier program had been used to create a secret pool of funds that was used to grant favors to a few "special" people.

Jaspin's computer analysis showed that a number of individuals with political connections had used this low-interest money to purchase expensive homes. And, although other individuals who received RIHMFC loans had to pay as much as 13.75% for a mortgage, these "special" people were given 8.5% loans from the secret pool. The list of individuals who received these loans made very interesting reading. It included the daughter of a former governor, the son of a former state treasurer, the daughter of a former state senate majority leader, bank officials, and several RIHMFC employees.

As a result of the Journal's computer-based investigation and disclosures, the director of the agency was charged with fraud and later went to jail.² A total of 25 indictments resulted from official state investigations spurred by the newspaper's disclosures, and the scandal forced a complete overhaul of the policies of the RIHMFC agency. It was a classic case of investigative reporting that resulted in significant reform.

What are the implications of this example of CAIR? That is, how did the agency manage to conceal its illegal activities? After all, the tapes Jaspin used were public records, and the state's open records laws mandated access to this information. Jaspin wondered, then, why the agency made no attempt to hide any of the fraudulent transactions when they were originally recorded on paper and on magnetic tape. The information was there for any determined individual to find.

Jaspin finally concluded that the head of the agency had made two assumptions: The first was that no one would take the time to go through the paper documents. The second was that even if someone obtained the computer tapes, no one would know what to do with them. These assumptions were not unreasonable at the time. First, Jaspin estimated that it would take a reporter 73 weeks to go through all of the paper records, even if that reporter spent only 5 minutes on each mortgage. That would certainly prevent even the most determined individual from poring through the documents. Second, and more important for this book, in 1985 most journalists did not know much about electronic records and few had tried to use computers, other than for word processing. For one thing, analytical software was not usually available in newsrooms and the knowledge, skills, and technology necessary to make use of computerized data often seemed formidable. Even several years later, Jaspin reported that only about 30 newspapers had any kind of organized program to use computerized records.³

By now, however, the picture has changed. CAIR analyses and the use of computer technology by investigative and other kinds of journalists have become more common. In fact, investigative journalism has entered a new era in its historical development. To provide an understanding of where it began, and the nature of these developments, the early chapters of this book trace the events that brought together one of the most important traditions of American journalism with the electronic technology of data analysis. Out of this merging has come an important new era in the history of the press as the watchdog for society. The combination of traditional investigative journalism and the ability to look at masses of public records kept on magnetic tape have become an invaluable means whereby reporters can alert the public to unsatisfactory performance by public officials and agencies, as took place in Rhode Island.

The Evolution of the Press as a Fourth Estate

How did this combination of traditional and technological skills come about to modify the nature of journalism's watchdog function? The answer to that question requires an understanding of the development of both investigative reporting and of the technological changes that led government agencies to adopt computerized record keeping. In the sections that follow, the development of traditional investigative reporting is outlined. (The technological changes that led to computerized records are discussed in the next chapter).

Historically, investigative reporting evolved from the belief in the function of the press as a fourth estate during the earliest years of the newspaper. It was a concept that developed mainly in France, England, and the American colonies during the 18th century. During that period, the press did not engage in a watchdog function as we know it today. It was opinion-based journalism. The fourth estate concept was exercised mainly by criticizing government and its officials in print. It was not based on investigative strategies for systematically gathering factual information about unacceptable situations to be disclosed to the public in the form of news stories. That form of journalism would not appear until the 19th century.

The Fou...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• 1 From Bordello to Watergate and Beyond: The Changing Nature of Investigative Reporting
• 2 Coming Together: Computers, Government Record Keepers, and Journalists
• 3 Freedom of Information Laws: The Legal Status of Electronic Records
• 4 Computer-Assisted Investigative Reporting: Its Development, Definition, and Current Status
• 5 Basic CAIR Techniques: As Used in Contemporary Newsrooms
• 6 Analyzing Large-Scale Electronic Records: An Example Using Data From the Federal Courts
• 7 CAIR Analyses and the Press: Problems of Reporting on Disclosures
• 8 Social Science, Precision Journalism, and CAIR: A Conceptual Comparison
• 9 A Formal Methodology for CAIR Analyses
• Appendix
• Index