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Reveal

Reveal

from The Center for Investigative Reporting

Shoshana Walter

Reporter

Shoshana Walter is a reporter for Reveal, covering criminal justice. She and reporter Amy Julia Harris exposed how courts across the country are sending defendants to rehabs that are little more than lucrative work camps for private industry. Their work was a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in national reporting. It also won the Knight Award for Public Service, a Sigma Delta Chi Award for investigative reporting, and an Edward R. Murrow Award, and was a finalist for the Selden Ring, IRE and Livingston Awards. It led to numerous government investigations, two criminal probes and five federal class-action lawsuits alleging slavery, labor violations and fraud.

Walter's investigation on America's armed security guard industry revealed how armed guard licenses have been handed out to people with histories of violence, even people barred by courts from owning guns. Walter and reporter Ryan Gabrielson won the 2015 Livingston Award for Young Journalists for national reporting based on the series, which prompted new laws and an overhaul of California’s regulatory system. For her 2016 investigation about the plight of "trimmigrants," marijuana workers in California's Emerald Triangle, Walter embedded herself in illegal mountain grows and farms. There, she encountered an epidemic of sex abuse and human trafficking in the industry – and a criminal justice system focused more on the illegal drugs. The story prompted legislation, a criminal investigation and grass-roots efforts by the community, including the founding of a worker hotline and safe house.

Walter began her career as a police reporter for The Ledger in Lakeland, Florida, and previously covered violent crime and the politics of policing in Oakland, California, for The Bay Citizen. Her narrative nonfiction as a local reporter garnered a national Sigma Delta Chi Award and a Gold Medal for Public Service from the Florida Society of News Editors. A graduate of Mount Holyoke College, she has been a Dart Center Ochberg fellow for journalism and trauma at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a John Jay/Harry Frank Guggenheim fellow in criminal justice journalism. She is based in Reveal's Emeryville, California, office.

swalter@revealnews.org
swalter@revealnews.org 510-809-3160 shoeshine
Posted inAnd Justice for Some, The Trump Era

Texas governor pulls funds from ‘sanctuary’ county

by Shoshana Walter February 2, 2017February 2, 2017

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott canceled funds for Travis County after Sheriff Sally Hernandez refused to back down from her plans to institute a sanctuary city policy.

Posted inInequality, Trimmigrants

Labor union sets its sights on organizing pot workers

by Shoshana Walter November 22, 2016November 22, 2016

One of the largest labor unions in the country is pushing California regulators to better protect marijuana workers in the wake of legalization by requiring health and safety training.

Posted inInequality, Trimmigrants

Pot trimmers wanted in death of grower

by Shoshana Walter November 14, 2016November 14, 2016

Five “trimmigrants” are accused of murdering their former employer as he slept on his marijuana farm in Laytonville, California.

Posted inInequality, The Trump Era, Trimmigrants, Worked Over

As legalization catches fire, where will Trump land on pot?

by Shoshana Walter November 9, 2016January 29, 2017

President-elect Donald Trump once called the county’s drug enforcement efforts “a joke.” He once said legalizing drugs was a better tactic. But as the dust settles after a contentious election – and after another eight states legalized some form of weed – the future of marijuana under Trump isn’t quite clear.

Posted inVoting

Georgia man makes bid to become county’s first black commissioner

by Stan Alcorn and Shoshana Walter November 7, 2016November 7, 2016

In the nearly 200-year history of Gwinnett County, every official elected to countywide office has been white.

Posted inImmigration, Inequality, Trimmigrants, Worked Over

What’s happened since our report on sex abuse in the pot industry

by Shoshana Walter November 4, 2016June 30, 2021

All through the fall, hopeful marijuana trimmers have poured into California’s Emerald Triangle for coveted jobs. If they haven’t read our investigation, they may not know about the dangers they face. But is anyone doing anything about it?

Posted inInequality, Voting

Disabled and disenfranchised: Families fight to restore voting rights

by Shoshana Walter October 31, 2016June 30, 2021

Across the country, thousands of people with appointed guardians routinely lose the right to vote under state laws. Some say the laws prevent voter manipulation and fraud. But advocates say they are built on flawed assumptions about the abilities of disabled people.

Posted inCriminal Justice, Inequality, Law Enforcement, Local Law Enforcement, Trimmigrants

How to (and not to) address worker abuse on pot farms

by Shoshana Walter October 20, 2016October 20, 2016

The Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office, a small agency of about 65 sworn officers, was able to pull off a complex investigation into abuse and trafficking on a marijuana farm.

Posted inGuns, Hired Guns

Why California cracked down on oversight of armed security guards

by Shoshana Walter September 29, 2016September 29, 2016

Our investigation found regulators in California and many other states frequently license armed guards who are poorly trained, mentally unstable and prone to violence.

Posted inAccountability, Criminal Justice, Local Law Enforcement, Trimmigrants, Workers’ Rights

Pot growers call for labor regulation after abuse disclosures

by Shoshana Walter September 13, 2016November 3, 2016

The director of the California Growers Association now is calling for a series of solutions after Reveal published an investigation into sexual abuse in the state’s pot country.

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