It reads: "There should be no fetters on reporters, nor must they tamper with the truth, but give light so the people will find their own way." "Report on Alleged Involvement: Findings" 43. With hindsight, Bell says, "the signs were there. Garry Webb wrote the 1996 "Dark Alliance" series for the San Jose Mercury News. It sounds like a Tom Clancy novel, right? This emotive last phrase refers to Webb's experience in the immediate aftermath of publication of his three lengthy articles, in the summer of 1996. Both sides were left angry and disappointed. "[78], While finding this part of the series unsupported, Schou said that some of the series's claims on CIA involvement are supported, writing that "The CIA conducted an internal investigation that acknowledged in March 1998 that the agency had covered up Contra drug trafficking for more than a decade." Webb, whose plans to become a journalist had begun when he was 13, but never included equine death notices, resigned from the Mercury News a few months later. When they married, she was aged just 21. Work with a bunch of drug dealers to run guns? Webb's corpse was found in the bedroom, with two gunshot wounds to the head. 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. In and out of work, he had a reputation for taking risks. The Mercury News, who originally stood by Webb's reporting, complied with these new denunciations and published an apology for the series in May 1997. As a result, some major US newspapers ignored its findings completely, while others relegated a brief summary to their inside pages. Kill the Messenger, a movie starring Jeremy Renner, just opened, about the life and death of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb, who committed suicide in 2004. "But Gary thought that if something was true, it should be told. Hired by the San Jose Mercury News, Webb contributed to the paper's Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. Jeremy Renner plays Gary Webb in "Kill the Messenger." (Chuck Zlotnick/Focus Features) Webb resigned and wrote a book defending his reporting. Contemporary discussions of the series are discussed in the section on, Webb 2011, "Caltrans Ignored Elevated Freeway Safety. By a fortunate coincidence of timing, the report was released on a day when the Monica Lewinsky scandal dominated every front page in the country. The claim that the drug ring of Meneses-Blandn-Ross sparked the "crack explosion" has been perhaps the most criticized part of the series. Actor Jeremy Renner portrays Webb.[83]. Because Blandn cooperated with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), he spent only 28 months in prison, became a paid government informant, and received permanent resident status. Then, on 10 December, he resigned. [22], The lede of the first article set out the series' basic claims: "For the better part of a decade, a San Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and Bloods street gangs of Los Angeles and funneled millions in drug profits to a Latin American guerrilla army run by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency." Blandn and Meneses were Nicaraguans who smuggled drugs into the U.S. and supplied dealers like Ross. Who Is Gary Webb's Wife? He died by suicide on December 10, 2004. Although it did find that both men were major drug dealers, "guilty of enriching themselves at the expense of countless drug users," and that they had contributed money to the Contra cause, "we did not find that their activities were responsible for the crack cocaine epidemic in South Central Los Angeles, much less the rise of crack throughout the nation, or that they were a significant source of support for the Contras. But the biggest loss he had was the writing. He accepted Christ at an early age. Suzette is preceded in death by: Mother: Geneice Taylor Thomas. Such a case normally would have sparked little notice. . 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. When Attorney General Janet Reno determined that a delay was no longer necessary, the report was released unaltered. "[77], Webb's reporting in "Dark Alliance" remains controversial. When he was engaged, he worked hard. Although Blandn's cartel was undoubtedly one of the first to bring crack to LA, Webb was almost certainly suffering a rush of blood when he described the group as "the first pipeline" into the city. Obituaries / August 21, 2021. It was written by Jesse Katz, the same reporter who, less than two years earlier, had described Ross's conglomerate as "the Wal-Mart of crack dealing". gary webb obituary WEBB, Gary W. Age 67, passed away Monday, March 27, 2017 in the home he built in Madison Township. Take it from someone who knew him well. One article, dealing mostly with the response of the Los Angeles Black community to the stories, described the series's evidence as "thin". ". Garcia is deputy director of the John S Knight Fellowships in Journalism at Stanford University. But while Webb overreached, some key findings in "Dark Alliance" were on target-and important. 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. [59], The first volume of the report found no evidence that "any past or present employee of CIA, or anyone acting on behalf of CIA, had any direct or indirect dealing" with Ross, Blandn, or Meneses or that any of the other figures mentioned in "Dark Alliance" were ever employed by or associated with or contacted by the agency. Webb, a former San Jose Mercury News reporter, was found dead in his Carmichael home Friday morning. "To get back at his editors?". Gary Webb, (born August 31, 1955, Corona, California, U.S.died December 10, 2004, Carmichael, California), American investigative journalist who wrote a three-part series for the San Jose Mercury News in 1996 on connections between the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the U.S.-backed Contra army seeking to overthrow Nicaragua's leftist government, and cocaine trafficking into the United . 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. Some might consider it an inappropriate assignment for a man with responsibilities. "[80], Not all writers agree that the Inspector-General's report supported the series's claims. "It was terrible," said Price. The legendary civil-rights activist Dick Gregory was arrested while he protested outside the CIA's headquarters; Gregory began referring to the organisation as "Crack in America". With Baca's encouragement, he started to investigate a large-scale Nicaraguan cocaine dealer named Oscar Danilo Blandn. "Like enjoy it.". She kept crying about how terrible it all was - by which I mean that she was, physically, crying. Family (1) According to Bell, Webb had been unhappy for some time . "I'd get discouraged," she said, "but I never really gave up hope." Back in 1997, SN&R brought the controversy about Gary Webb to readers with "Secrets and Lies," a cover story about why the mainstream media attacked . In . What he found, he wrote later, "nearly knocked me off my chair". [81], Peter Kornbluh, a researcher at George Washington University's National Security Archives, also does not agree that the report vindicated the series. He placed his keys and ID cards on the kitchen table, together with a cremation certificate he had purchased for himself. I ask Bell. 17 years ago, Gary Webb wrote a series of articles that said some bad things about the CIA and drug traffickers. On the last day Webb was alive, his motorbike broke down while he was moving to his mother's house. It found that CIA officials ignored information about possible Contra drug dealing; that they continued to work with Contra supporters despite allegations that they were trafficking drugs, and further asserted that officials from the CIA instructed Drug Enforcement Agency officers to refrain from investigating alleged dealers connected with the Contras. So, how much is Gary Webb worth at the age of 49 years old? Her husband began his career on The Kentucky Post, and rapidly proved himself to be the sort of character who can be a secretive agency's worst nightmare: a full-blooded provocateur who liked to put the hours in at the library. Did Gary Webb really stray from his wife? "That's right," says Blum. The drugs went to South Central LA. After the series's publication, the Northern California branch of the national Society of Professional Journalists voted Webb "Journalist of the Year" for 1996. "People told me that," she says. But they underestimated the paradigm shifting power of the internet, and the intelligence of Webb, who not only listed the explosive story online . House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, CIA involvement in Contra cocaine trafficking, "To readers of our 'Dark Alliance' series", "America's 'crack' plague has roots in Nicaragua war", "War on drugs has unequal impact on black Americans", "Los Angeles Sheriff's Department Inquiry Findings", "The CIA and Crack: Evidence Is Lacking Of Alleged Plot", "Though Evidence Is Thin, Tale of C.I.A. "Which was that, if he wanted a future within the political establishment of the United States, then he should concentrate on other aspects of life.". His former wife, her voice lowered to a whisper, explains that Webb missed with the first shot (which exited through his left cheek). Webb's continuing reporting also triggered a fourth investigation. In February last year he was laid off by the State Legislature. The collection, The Killing Game: Selected Stories from the Author of Dark Alliance, was edited by Webb's son, Eric. Webb undeniably made mistakes of detail and emphasis in the newspaper version of "Dark Alliance". "[38], Surprised by The Washington Post article, The Mercury News's executive editor Jerome Ceppos wrote to the Post defending the series. He also defended the series in interviews with all three papers. In 2004, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb was found dead from an apparent suicide, as Democracy Now! [65], After leaving The Mercury News, Webb worked as an investigator for the California State Legislature. "[62] It also found no evidence to support Webb's suggestion that several other drug smugglers mentioned in the series were associated with the CIA, or that anyone associated with the CIA or other intelligence agencies was involved in supplying or selling drugs in Los Angeles.[62]. It was published in 1998 as Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. 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. Then, in August the same year, the first of three instalments of "Dark Alliance" appeared. Asking why crack became so prevalent in the Black community of Los Angeles, the article credited Blandn, referring to him as "the Johnny Appleseed of crack in California. Much of the article highlighted the failure of law enforcement agencies to successfully prosecute them and stated that this was largely due to their Contra and CIA connections. "You do not understand the power of these people," he adds, referring to the US intelligence services. Age 43 years. Webb's then-wife Sue remembers coming home from the shops and finding her. "Look at what happened to Gary Webb. Webb, according to Bell, was a man who, more than most, found that his mood and self-esteem fluctuated in accordance with his professional fortunes. 'Dark Alliance' - both as journalism and as a book - is a convoluted narrative, but the crucial link it establishes is between the "agricultural salesman" Oscar Danilo Blandn, a Contra sympathiser with close CIA links, and his best customer, an LA drug dealer known as "Freeway" Ricky Ross. He told me: 'If I can't do what I want to do, what's the point?' When removal men arrived, on the morning of 10 December 2004, they found a sign on his front door, which read: ''Please do not enter. 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." Gary Webb was an investigative reporter, focusing on government and private sector corruption and winning more than 30 journalism awards. By the end of September, three federal investigations had been announced: an investigation into the CIA allegations conducted by CIA Inspector-General Frederick Hitz, an investigation into the law enforcement allegations by Justice Department Inspector-General Michael Bromwich, and a second investigation into the CIA by the House Intelligence Committee. WEBB, Mr. Gary Lee, our beloved son, husband, father, grandfather, brother and uncle went home with his heavenly Father Monday, August 29, 2011 at University of Michigan Hospital. [39] The Post refused to print his letter. Managed by: Pam Wilson (may be slow to respond) Last Updated: Ceppos and Garcia have long since lost any taste for public discussion of "Dark Alliance". The article suggested this was in retribution for Ross' testimony in the corruption case. Investigative journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of stories in 1996 for the San Jose Mercury News that documented the US-government-backed Contra insurgents' drug pipeline into Los Angeles. After Ceppos' column, The Mercury News spent the next several months conducting an internal review of the story. Gary Webb, a journalist at The San Jose Mercury News, thought it was a far-fetched story to begin with, but in 1995 and 1996, he dug in and produced a deeply reported and deeply flawed three-part . 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