Dubai: Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jim Schaefer visited Gulf News yesterday to share his experience as an investigative reporter at the Detroit Free Press.
Schaefer is visiting Dubai as part of the the international exchange programme, “Unlocking the Economic Potential of Digital Media”, managed by the International Centre for Journalists (ICFJ), with partners including Impact Hub Dubai and funded by the US State Department’s Professional Fellows Programme. Thirty professional fellows were brought to the United States for four weeks from the Middle East and North Africa to learn leading-edge practices in digital media institutions.
Schaefer, Assistant Editor for Enterprise and Investigations at Detroit Free Press, worked on cases that dealt with wrongfully convicted citizens of Detroit, day to day crimes and most of all Kwame Kilpatrick’s career as Mayor of Detroit, Michigan.
As a reporter in the United States, the Shield Law found in many states protects a source in instances where anonymity is necessary.
With this law, a journalist cannot be forced to reveal a source’s identity that could jeopardise their safety; however, the Shield Law does not apply when writing about the federal government. Schaefer used the Pulitzer Prize-winning article, “Mayor lied under oath, text messages to show”, as an example of information disclosed by an anonymous source to be published in the newspaper.
The mayor was accused of having an affair with his Chief of Staff, Christine Beatty, and lied under oath when asked about the affair in court. Schaefer got text messages from a source that proved the existence of this affair between Kilpatrick and Beatty. The source was kept anonymous for safety reasons and Schaefer was able to use these text messages to support his case without violating privacy.
“This was not a violation of Kilpatrick’s privacy because they were city-issued pagers that they were typing to each other on,” he said, “not his personal phone.”
As a teacher at the University of Michigan in Dearborn, Schaefer highlights that journalism is a career he personally enjoys because it is about giving a voice to the voiceless.
Maria Botros is a trainee at Gulf News.
