Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Exclusive all-formats coverage of joint concert by North and South Korea

for exclusive, all-formats access to a rare music concert by North and South Korean musicians in Shanghai. Kim, who had written about a failed 2015 attempt at a two-Koreas orchestra, acted on a tip from a good source, preparing the story and handing it off to Kang, who won over wary organizers and musicians. The coverage won play in South Korea’s top media outlets and internationally. https://bit.ly/2W22Zgy

Best of the States

25 years after unresolved killings, O.J. Simpson tells AP: ‘life is fine’

Two weeks before the 25th anniversary of the killings that led to O.J. Simpson’s “Trial of the Century,” special correspondent Linda Deutsch was summoned from retirement to try to coax an interview from the fallen football star. Simpson hadn’t submitted to an interview since being released from prison in 2017, and he turned down an interview request from Deutsch last year. But Deutsch tried again, this time by phone. O.J. didn't want to talk, but he relented after Deutsch reminded him that if he spoke to her, AP’s story would reach all media.

Simpson wouldn’t discuss the crime, but he provided a glimpse into a life now very much outside the public eye, telling Deutsch “life is fine,” a quote that stung any who believed he got away with murder.

Deutsch’s story, including two photos of Simpson at home that were exclusive to the AP, was the day’s top-read AP story online, and the centerpiece of a multi-story package looking back at Simpson’s trial, its key figures and its impact.

For a timely, exclusive interview with a man who remains the focus of intense public interest, Linda Deutsch receives AP’s Best of the States award.

Best of the States

APNewsBreak: Navy reassigns unconventional war college head after AP reveals probe

“... Due to the distractions caused by the unfounded AP article last week, I am stepping down as President of YOUR college effective immediately.”

Rear Admiral Jeffrey Harley, head of the elite U.S. Naval War College, pushed the button on that all-staff missive Monday after the Navy announced it was reassigning him in the wake of exclusive reporting by Jennifer McDermott and Michelle R. Smith – reporting that produced two APNewsBreaks in 72 hours.

Their first NewsBreak moved Friday, confirming the military was investigating allegations that Harley spent excessively, abused his hiring authority and otherwise behaved inappropriately, including keeping a margarita machine in his office. Three days later, the AP team was first again with word that the Navy was removing Harley from his post pending the outcome of its probe.

Both stories gained huge traction with customers and on social media. The scoops by McDermott’s and Smith were “just the tip of the iceberg,” one source said, and they’ve since led to new tips.

For dogged and diligent reporting that exposed questionable leadership at the heart of the Navy’s brain trust, McDermott and Smith win this week’s Best of the States prize.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Reporting on border graveyards prompts change in wall construction

for a story on two 19th-century cemeteries that stood in the way of the president’s border wall. The Trump administration had refused to give specifics about its plans for the cemeteries, but after the story, including interviews with family members of people buried there, the administration shifted course, avoiding the graveyards in the wall construction project. https://bit.ly/2QNsxJe

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Seoul bureau avoids false reports of North Korean purge

for healthy skepticism over a South Korean newspaper’s report of a major purge in North Korea. That saved AP from the embarrassment suffered by some other media as North Korean state media began showing images of the supposedly purged officials with leader Kim Jong Un. The Seoul bureau recognized the danger signs, producing a story that acknowledged the report while also sounding a note of caution. Several South Korean media outlets noted how AP emphasized the suspect nature of the initial report. https://bit.ly/2HYvGTN

Best of the States

The one that got away: Survivor of serial killer adds emotion, depth to execution coverage

Execution coverage often focuses on the condemned inmate or the manner of death. So, faced with covering his eighth execution – a Florida serial killer – Tallahassee correspondent Brendan Farrington told the extraordinary personal story of a victim who escaped and helped police find the man after he raped her decades ago. That woman had chosen to witness the man’s execution.

Farrington doggedly tracked down the woman, now a sheriff’s deputy, who finally agreed to an interview on the eve of the execution. Her compelling story resonated with readers everywhere.

For his persistence and sensitivity in telling a personal and emotional victim’s story in what could have been a rote story on a serial killer’s execution, Farrington wins this week’s Best of the States award.

Best of the States

APNewsBreak: Military prosecutors sent tracking software to defense team, reporter

Los Angeles courts reporter Brian Melley was enjoying a Sunday afternoon when a longtime legal source reached out with a remarkable tip in the case of Edward Gallagher, a Navy SEAL facing a court martial on charges he murdered a teenage Islamic State fighter in Iraq in 2017.

The source told Melley that military prosecutors, frustrated by leaks in the case, planted tracking software in emails sent to defense lawyers and a reporter. The unsophisticated software was quickly discovered by the recipients.

Melley worked up the story, including an interview with a military law expert who thought the tactic was ethically, legally and intellectually dubious. His story hit the wire the next morning, quickly gaining traction online. AP was widely credited everywhere it appeared and no major media outlet matched it.

For giving AP an exclusive on an important military justice story, Melley wins this week’s Best of the States award.

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP examines patient consent before pelvic exams; states, med schools split on legislation

“Don’t dismiss a [story] idea just because it’s unfamiliar. Pelvic exams aren’t exactly in the wheelhouse of the State Government Team, but it turned out to be a really terrific and distinctive topic.”

That’s one editor’s takeaway from a story by Providence, Rhode Island, reporter Jennifer McDermott and Seattle medical writer Carla Johnson, both of whom, acting on a heads-up from New York photo editor Jenny Kane, found that it’s common practice for medical students to perform a pelvic exam on women under anesthesia as part of their training. Whether the patients have given consent for that exam is not clear, drawing the interest of state lawmakers.

The pair faced multiple obstacles in reporting the story, including initial reluctance by doctors and harried legislators to discuss the issue, but McDermott and Johnson succeeded in defining the conflict between medical schools and elected officials seeking to protect patient rights. Their efforts resulted in a unique story that received heavy play among major AP customers, both online and in print.

For their teamwork, execution and sensitive handling of a complex topic, McDermott, Johnson and Kane win AP’s Best of the Week award.

Best of the States

AP Exclusive: Schedules reveal West Virginia governor largely absent from work

Anthony Izaguirre began hearing the chatter about West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice as soon as he started work as the AP’s statehouse correspondent in Charleston, West Virginia, in late February. Sources told him Justice – a billionaire who owns mines, farms and a swanky resort – wasn’t fully engaged and hadn’t even been in the capital, Charleston, much since taking office in 2017.

Izaguirre's initial request for the governor’s schedules was declined, but he pressed with the help of AP’s legal department, finally getting the records. Armed with those calendars and his own resourceful reporting, he cobbled together a record of the governor’s activities, confirming what many suspected: Justice appeared to have better things to do than govern.

West Virginia media pounced on the exclusive story, which also played well outside the state.

For his resolute work to obtain public records and his thorough reporting to fill out a story no one else in the state could land, Izaguirre wins this week’s Best of the States award.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP reveals: Pakistani Christian girls trafficked to China as brides

for an excellent example of cross-regional cooperation that uncovered how Pakistan’s poor Christian population has become a new target in China’s market for foreign brides, leading to hundreds of girls being trafficked to China – a trade that has not been previously reported in international media. In the slums around Punjab, Gannon immersed herself in Pakistan’s Christian community, meeting a dozen brides and girls, and finding brokers and local priests complicit in the trade. Kang, meanwhile, worked the China side. With Wang’s help he eventually tracked down one husband in a small village, providing the other side of the story. The result was the first story on the subject beyond small stories in Pakistani media that didn’t capture the full scope of the trade. https://bit.ly/2PSpNtDhttps://bit.ly/2VDl1q7

Best of the Week — First Winner

Money madness: AP analyzes, how much is that NCAA berth worth?

It’s no secret that the NCAA college basketball tournament is big business. But just how big, and how has the pie been divided?

The New York-based team of college sports reporter Ralph Russo and data journalist Larry Fenn took on that reporting and accounting challenge, making AP the first news organization to document who received more than $3 billion in March Madness payouts over two decades.

Complicating their task was the fact that the NCAA referred to payments with a complex “unit” formula, while 32 different athletic conferences had their own rules for distributing the funds back to schools. Russo peppered the NCAA with questions, ultimately getting detailed numbers back to 1997. Fenn parsed tournament results to quantify wins and bids that qualified for payment under the system.

The work led to several stories by Russo and his colleagues in Sports detailing the money side of the annual tournament, including diminishing shares for smaller conferences, an explainer on the system itself and the value of the final invitations to the field. Fenn also collaborated on a data distribution for members doing their own stories focused on individual schools, as well as a robust interactive.

The AP-exclusive stories drew extensive play in the heat of March Madness, showcasing the power of AP when we think ambitiously and outside the box, even around annual events already in the glare of the media spotlight. For their outstanding work, Russo and Fenn win AP’s Best of the Week.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Source development, persistence land AP scoop with clues to failed Venezuelan uprising

The plot was bold: Fuel a military uprising in Venezuela by shifting the loyalty of key leaders, putting them in opposition to President Nicolas Maduro. But the plan to help the U.S.-backed opposition leader backfired at the moment of truth, prompting an understandable reaction from press to find out what went wrong.

While most other media speculated, AP Andean News Director Joshua Goodman used dogged reporting and years of source development to break the untold story of how the Obama and Trump administrations missed golden opportunities to woo two generals that the White House said were central to the plan.

The story garnered major play among customers and APNews users, and even earned the attention of U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, a driver of U.S. policy on Venezuela, who praised Goodman on Twitter.

For unearthing pivotal clues around a shadowy turn of international events, Goodman wins AP’s Best of the Week.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Outstanding all-formats coverage of Spanish election

for distinctive and comprehensive all-formats coverage of the Spanish election, yielding front-page exposure even in Spain’s leading media. And they continued to stand out on the day after the election with an all-formats Only on AP story from the town in southern Spain where the far-right Vox party scored its biggest victory with 30% of the vote.https://bit.ly/2vNDHUFhttps://bit.ly/2Wg12Kbhttps://bit.ly/2Lt0cZG

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Dedicated reporting in case against Hawaii’s law enforcement power couple

for years of beat work and shoe leather reporting on the city’s former police chief and his wife, a powerful city prosecutor. The couple now faces trial on corruption charges as prosecutors say they paid for their lavish lifestyle by lying, stealing and cheating their family and clients. Kelleher’s intimate knowledge of the case enabled her to set up the trial in a way no other media could match. https://bit.ly/2Wkq76E

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Provocative first interview with new Palestinian PM

for the first international media interview with new Palestinian prime minister Mohammad Shtayyeh. Shtayyeh accused the United States of declaring “financial war” on his people and said a purported American peace plan will be “born dead,” a comment that prompted angry reaction from the White House. https://bit.ly/2VovBjB

Best of the States

A powerful retrospective and breaking news, 20 years after Columbine mass shooting

Twenty years have passed since the Columbine high school massacre, which was, to many people, the beginning of school shootings as we know them. In those years, life has changed: Mass shootings happen again and again, schoolchildren participate in lockdowns instead of fire drills, and many reflect on the moment in time when two young men took 13 lives with them on their suicidal quest.

AP was uniquely positioned to cover the two decades since the massacre, with journalists who were there, those who cover the Colorado community every day, and experts in polling, education and guns. Stories by Denver reporter Kathleen Foody and videojournalist Peter Banda led a deep all-formats package by dozens of journalists across the AP telling not just of the carnage but of those who survived it, their struggle, and the future.

But all the planning couldn't prepare anyone for this spot development: Early in the week, Sol Pais, a young Florida woman, prompted panic over a possible attack at Columbine, later taking her own life near the Colorado school. Miami reporter Kelli Kennedy tracked down a good friend of Pais who not only filled in personal details about her in an exclusive interview, but supplied photos of Pais and cast doubt on the official narrative about her friend.

The overarching theme of the spot and enterprise coverage focused on the short and long-term mental health issues from school shootings. The result was a unique, meaningful package that received impressive play nationally – online and in print. The video was among the top-used AP videos of the week.

For their work spearheading the package, and breaking news, Foody, Banda and Kennedy win this week’s Best of the States.

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP photographers capture defining images of Tiger and Trump

This week we celebrate two very different, yet equally important photo wins.

David Phillip and the AP photo team assigned to the Masters tournament created some of the iconic images of Tiger Woods’ historic win – the result of strategic planning, teamwork and execution.

And Pablo Martinez Monsivais wins for his startling capture of the media reflected in the eye of President Donald Trump, taking what could easily have been treated as just another ho-hum daily Trump photo op and “seeing” something so different.

For delivering outstanding images from two contrasting but highly competitive assignments – and demonstrating how vital the AP is in the photojournalism world – Phillip and Monsivais share AP’s Best of the Week Award.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP scoop on all-male Morehouse admitting transgender students

for breaking major news about an iconic all-male black college allowing transgender students for the first time. It was a notable shift for Atlanta’s Morehouse College and came as colleges around the country have been wrestling with LGBT questions. The scoop prompted local and national media to match the story. https://bit.ly/2Ur5vYP

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Venezuela’s ex-spy chief arrested in Madrid on US warrant

for breaking the news that Venezuela’s former spy chief Hugo Carvajal had been arrested in Spain on a U.S. warrant. AP was the first media to confirm the arrest and put out a sourced report with the correct details, beating all competitors and also getting a rare scoop on Spanish media in their own backyard. AP was cited across the world including by Al-Jazeera, the Miami Herald and Portugal’s Lusa news agency. https://bit.ly/2v9BToy

Best of the States

AP analysis: Sports betting has not been the jackpot some states expected

When the Supreme Court allowed all states to offer betting on sports, some lawmakers across the country saw an opportunity: Here was a way to bolster state budgets with revenue from an activity that was already happening in the shadows. But an AP review showed that actual tax revenue has yet to match expectations in the majority of states that legalized sports gambling.

State government team reporter Geoff Mulvihill, based in New Jersey, and Rhode Island statehouse reporter Jennifer McDermott looked through monthly state revenue reports and then compared the tax revenue generated to the original estimates in the legislation that authorized sports betting. They found that in four of the six states that legalized it last year – Rhode Island, West Virginia, Mississippi and Pennsylvania – tax revenue was far below what the state had projected it would be.

The revenue story was the latest in a string of distinctive stories from reporters working the sports betting beat. Many of the stories, including the state revenue piece, have been accompanied by a data set compiled by Mulvihill that tracks every piece of legislation related to sports gambling. It is being made available to all AP customers who subscribe to our data distribution platform and has been promoted to local reporters as a way to add context to their stories.

For revealing the difference between lawmakers’ promises on tax revenue and the reality, Mulvihill and McDermott win this week’s Best of the States prize.