Best of the Week — First Winner

AP spotlights remarkable rise of federal prison official accused of misconduct

Mike Balsamo in Washington and Mike Sisak in New York trained a lens on a single Bureau of Prisons official, Thomas Ray Hinkle, who received promotions across four decades despite repeated allegations of abuse, misconduct and even admissions by him that he’d beaten inmates in the past as part of a gang of guards called “The Cowboys.”

After being tipped earlier this year to Hinkle’s past, Sisak and Balsamo went about securing and scrutinizing 1,600 pages of documents that provided details of the allegations and developed key sources within the prisons system who corroborated the accusations. Finally, toward the end of the reporting process, they secured comment from Hinkle and the bureau, both of which acknowledged his previous excesses but said he was a changed man.

For a dogged and impactful investigation that caps a year in which their reporting has shaken the hierarchy of the federal prison systems and forced officials to confront abuses long out of public view, Balsamo and Sisak are Best of the Week 1st Winners.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Heart-wrenching loss of young boy in California illustrates peril of California flooding

in Los Angeles humanized, in the most gripping fashion, the floods that hit California. His interviews with the parents of a 5-year-old boy who was swept away by floodwaters give a heart-wrenching look at the impacts of the flooding. With sensitive reporting, exclusive details and vivid storytelling, Melley offered a compelling and comprehensive account of the tragedy.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Brazilian capital's chaotic uprising

sprang into action on Jan. 8 when violence erupted in Brazil’s capital. Supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro rampaged through the presidential palace, Supreme Court and Congress.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

All-format CES team turns tech event into win for creative content and audience engagement

on the ground in Las Vegas drove unprecedented audience engagement for the annual CES tech show, where more than 3,000 companies push their innovations. AP provided comprehensive coverage that touched on the metaverse, sustainability, the future of electric vehicles, the economic climate for startups and more. There were dozens of video edits, at least a dozen lives, hundreds of photos, and daily roundups of the coolest, most buzz-worthy tech, all curated on the Technology hub of APnews.com.Read more.

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP photographers paint definitive portrait of epic, historic vote for House speaker

Some likened it to a Renaissance painting – and it certainly belongs in a museum. We’re talking, of course, about Andrew Harnik’s indelible images of a tussle in Congress as a historic House speaker vote threatened to stretch into another week.

As Republicans struggled through 14 fruitless rounds of voting against an internal faction of rebels to elect Kevin McCarthy as House Speaker, the longest such struggle in a century, nerves were fraying.

But AP’s photographers in the chamber remained cool as ever.

Normally, photographers’ access in the House chamber is heavily restricted by the speaker’s office – but with no speaker, the photo team was able to take full advantage of a House with no rules. Able to freely roam the chamber and capture up-close moments, the team shot more than 14,000 images for review and editing. Over the four days of voting, 1,500 images moved to AP’s audiences.

Alex Brandon captured an image of Rep. Matt Gaetz, one of the last anti-McCarthy holdouts, talking tensely with McCarthy after the 14th vote. With most cameras trained on McCarthy, Harnik captured an unbelievable-if-it-weren’t-on-camera near-brawl, as Rep. Mike Rogers started to charge toward Gaetz – only to be pulled back by Rep. Richard Hudson.

That image, which quickly became iconic, and the work of the others in the AP photo team, earns Best of the Week – First Winner honors for Harnik, Applewhite, Brandon, Cortez, Kaster, Rourke and Walsh.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Mexico team explains country's struggle against femicide

spent months with victims' families and authorities to explain why decades after the problem of femicides was recognized by Mexico's leaders the killings of women continue at a frightening pace. They attended protest marches, court hearings and interviewed the prosecutor in charge of investigating such cases in Mexico state, the nation’s femicide leader.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Louisiana officers charged in Black motorist’s deadly arrest

broke news that likely would never have happened had it not been for their more than two years of dogged, consistently groundbreaking reporting: Five Louisiana law officers were indicted on state charges ranging from negligent homicide to malfeasance in the deadly 2019 arrest of Black motorist Ronald Greene.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP's Winfield holds Pope Francis’ Jesuit order to account by challenging superior to tell truth

held Pope Francis’ Jesuit order to account by challenging the superior general to come clean with the truth about a famous Jesuit artist accused of sexual and spiritual abuse of women under his care. The superior’s admission to Winfield – during a Christmas reception-turned-press conference – made headlines, and Winfield and AP were credited widely with having forced the Jesuits to answer uncomfortable questions and essentially admit they had lied. Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Census and race and ethnicity journalists tell multiformat story of Asian growth in Texas

used multiple formats to tell the story of Asian population growth in North Texas and how it's bringing change to the state. Spotting an Asian population growth trend in North Texas while covering the census beat, Schneider teamed up with Tang to get a fuller picture. The duo found a lot of the growth came from South Asians. Tang traveled to Texas, developing a story that put Texas’ growth into the context of overall Asian growth in the U.S. They also showed it’s not all Texas sunshine and smooth sailing for those trying to live their American dream. Some struggles, including racism and balancing being American and South Asian, can come with it.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Persistence pays off in delivering AP scoop on DOJ probe

immediately reached out to state and county officials in Georgia to find out if they had also received subpoenas and was told they had not. She filed open records requests with state and local governments and was told there were no records to provide. But she stayed on it. The extra effort paid off. Nearly a week into her reporting, a source called to say that Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger got a subpoena that day. Brumback immediately prepared a story while her source sent her the actual subpoena. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution credited the AP in describing the effort to compel Raffensberger’s cooperation.

Read more.

Best of the Week — First Winner

‘Method to the violence’: Dogged investigation and groundbreaking visuals document Bucha ‘cleansing’

An all formats team of AP journalists, working in partnership with PBS “Frontline” and SITU Research, used surveillance camera footage, intercepted phone calls and an exclusive 3D animation of Bucha to detail Russia’s monthlong reign of terror in the Ukrainian city.

The evidence collected, including 80.000 video files and thousands of audio files, told the chilling tale of the fall of Bucha and how, over the month that followed, Russian occupiers terrorized the local population with raids, torture and summary executions. In phone calls home Russian soldiers described “zachistka” — cleansing — killing civilians under orders from their leaders.

No other news organization has conducted such a deep and revealing analysis of the atrocities in Bucha.

For their meticulous, innovative work and their collaboration across formats and continents, the team of Erika Kinetz, Oleksandr Stashevskyi, Vasilisa Stepanenko, Adam Pemble, Allen Breed, Michael Biesecker, Jeannie Ohm and Dario Lopez is AP’s Best of the Week — First Winner.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Quick deployment, thoughtful reporting dominate Colorado shooting coverage

were among the staffers who responded quickly and thoughtfully as soon as word of a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Colorado Spring broke in the wee Sunday morning hours, resulting in all-formats response and top-notch coverage that lasted for days to come.

Read more.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Heartbreaking photos give rare personal look at fentanyl's toll on homeless people

When photographer Jae C. Hong returned to Los Angeles after a year in Japan, he was struck by how the number of homeless people had vastly multiplied. It was immediately before the pandemic -- and Hong, like so many reporters in the AP, spent much of the next year chronicling the impact of coronavirus.

Earlier this year, he was able to get back to the project he’d yearned to pursue and started chronicling homeless Angelenos between other assignments. One night, he encountered two police officers standing over a dead body -- and his project, spotlighting the lives, and sometimes the deaths, of fentanyl addicts, began to take shape.

Hong spent about six months documenting the humanitarian disaster. What he produced were gut-wrenching photos that gave a rare, intensely personal and brutally honest look into the tragedy unfolding on the streets of LA, an unconscionable scene often overlooked. AP writer Brian Melley, using Hong's reporting and experiences, crafted a story of equally vivid imagery that portrayed the raw human suffering with sensitivity to complete the package. The package was widely used and kept readers’ attention. The engagement score on AP News was a perfect 100 and Facebook featured it on its news feed.

For focusing on a problem that is too often unseen and producing a raw, compelling visual package, this week’s first Best of the Week is awarded to Los Angeles photojournalist Jae C. Hong.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Greater China staff delivers swift, compelling coverage of unprecedented lockdown protests

Even by the standards of Chinese state surveillance, the capital of the Xinjiang region stands out for the scope of repression. So, when protests broke out in Urumqi against coronavirus restrictions, AP journalists knew something unusual was happening.

It started with an apartment fire blamed by many on China’s harsh coronavirus measures. Dake Kang, who has covered the region closely for the past five years, scored an early interview with a relative of victims of the fire, beating out competitors. By reaching out to people on the ground online, Taipei-based writer Huizhong Wu confirmed protests that had followed, adding critical eyewitness accounts.

Within 24 hours of the fire, Chinese social media was swamped with anti-government messages – people angry at restrictions that have locked them into their homes for weeks or months at a time, and critically blaming the leadership. In a country where media is restricted, residents are surveilled, and individuals are punished for speaking out against authority, this was extraordinary.

As unrest spread, AP staff in Beijing, Bangkok and Hong Kong used all their tools and cooperated across borders to produce swift, careful coverage of the unprecedented demonstrations, earning Best of the Week 1st winner.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP details historic wins for LGBTQ candidates

revealed historic milestones for LGBTQ political representation in California and beyond. Well before Election Day, Thompson learned from LGBTQ groups that California lawmakers could hit a historic milestone this year: 10% representation in the state Legislature.

Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP dominates coverage of landmark trial over the downing of Flight MH17 over Ukraine

dominated the trial over the shooting-down of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17, continuing the AP’s ownership of this story from the time since the plane crashed down in a Ukrainian sunflower field in 2014. A Dutch court convicted three men of murder for their role in the shooting down of the plane with a Russian surface-to-air missile that killed all 298 people aboard as it flew over a separatist-controlled region of eastern Ukraine. There were some 1,000 hits on AP video filed the day of the verdict.Read more.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Monthslong investigation weaves sordid tale of debauchery within DEA

"The drug war is a game,” José Irizarry told two AP reporters during his final moments of freedom. “It was a very fun game that we were playing.”

Irizarry’s decision to spend some of his last few hours before beginning a 12-year federal prison sentence with two AP reporters in early 2022 was a moment years in the making that yielded a bombshell bacchanal of a story -- itself months in the making.

Four years ago, just before starting at The Associated Press, New York-based investigative reporter Jim Mustian received a tip about a DEA investigation into one of the agency’s own agents in Colombia. That spiraled into a string of AP scoops by Mustian and Miami-based Latin America correspondent Joshua Goodman on DEA corruption in Latin America, including an exclusive on the arrest of that agent. Irizarry had been accused of conspiring with Colombian drug cartels to divert millions from DEA money laundering stings in what prosecutors called one of the worst betrayals in DEA history.

For a deeply reported and compelling investigation, telling the tale of a former war-on-drugs warrior who crossed multiple boundaries, Mustian and Goodman earn AP’s Best of the Week — First Winner honors.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Team covering University of Virginia shooting earns reporting wins

kept the AP ahead and produced a nuanced and well-rounded report on the victims and students in the fatal shooting of three football players at the University of Virginia and wounding of two other students.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Israel environment story captures at-risk undersea habitats now protected

took readers on deep dive into the Mediterranean to see how conservation efforts can revive once lifeless coastlines.Read more.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP: Search for solutions drives race to save Bonneville salt flats

collaborated on the most comprehensive coverage yet by a major news organization on a shrinking natural wonder, the Bonneville Salt Flats in northwest Utah near the Nevada border.The salt flats has long lured speed-obsessed racers and filmmakers, and, more recently, social media fans looking for a spectacular photo, but its future is in peril because the salt has been thinning for decades. When a Utah state agency launched yet another study to assess what was happening at the salt flats, AP’s Salt Lake City bureau recognized an opportunity explore the state of one the American West’s most unique sites.A thoroughly reported, reader-friendly story and impressive visuals — photos, drone images, video and digital animations — combined for a striking presentation that drew in readers.Read more