Oct. 13, 2017

Best of the Week — First Winner

Exclusive visuals, reporting distinguish Vegas shooting coverage

It was just one of the many mysteries surrounding the Las Vegas concert shooting: How did the gunman, perched up on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay resort, fire off as many as 90 rounds onto thousands of concert-goers in just 10 seconds, killing 58 people and injuring hundreds?

Reporters Sadie Gurman and Mike Balsamo found the answer. Through sourcework, they learned that Stephen Paddock was able to carry out his assault in moments because he had used two “bump stocks,” devices that allow a semi-automatic rifle to repeatedly fire like a machine gun.

The scoop was part of an impressive week of coverage by staff in the Las Vegas bureau and across the AP that also included photographer John Locher’s dramatic images of police screaming for people to take cover as the gunman sprayed the crowd with bullets.

For their work in bringing critical details and images of the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history, Gurman, Balsamo and Locher win this week’s Beat of the Week prize.

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Sept. 16, 2016

Best of the Week — First Winner

Hawaiian seafood caught by foreign crews confined on boats

AP’s Martha Mendoza, an investigative reporter based in Bangkok, and Margie Mason, medical writer in Jakarta, found that hundreds of undocumented men, many from impoverished Southeast Asian and Pacific nations, work in this U.S. fishing fleet. They have no visas and aren't protected by basic labor laws because of a loophole passed by Congress.

A story detailing the men’s plight, by Mendoza and Mason, resulted from a tip following their award-winning Seafood from Slaves investigation last year. It earns the Beat of the Week.

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Jan. 12, 2018

Best of the Week — First Winner

Persistence pays: APNewsbreak on major changes in US marijuana policy

The source's message delivered by text was short and simple: "I have big news."

Sadie Gurman, a Justice Department reporter, had covered Colorado's first-in-the-nation pot experiment when she was a staffer in Denver, cultivating activists and law enforcement officials as sources. So when she transferred to Washington about a year ago, she had a burning question: When would Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a fierce opponent of decriminalization of marijuana, reverse the Obama administration’s hands-off approach to states that have legalized the drug?

The answer came last week and Gurman had the scoop – long before the competition and hours ahead of the official announcement. Her story earns the Beat of the Week.

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May 13, 2022

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP gives voice to evacuees of Mariupol steel plant siege

were determined to capture for all formats the stories of evacuees from the the bombarded Mariupol steel plant, delivering the first extended account of life in the bunkers under the plant as war raged overhead.In Zaporizhzhia the team staked out a car park for days, poised for a “safe passage” operation evacuating civilians from the besieged plant. When the buses arrived, AP’s coverage included extensive live video, and the following day the journalists spent two hours with a woman and her family who described their life below ground — and the feeling of “visiting the sky” when they would dare emerge from the bunkers.Read more

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Aug. 05, 2022

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Rare access to barrier islands reveals loss of pelican habitat

reported from the ground, the water and from the air to document the impact of climate change and land loss on the vanishing island breeding grounds of Louisiana’s brown pelicans, as well as the people and other wildlife that depend on this coastal ecosystem.After obtaining permission to visit the off-limits barrier islands, the all-formats trio revealed in words and striking visuals the effects of erosion and sea level rise on the coastal habitat and Louisiana’s saltwater marshes, and what remains to be lost: Louisiana’s state bird, the brown pelican, brought back over decades from the edge of extinction.Read more

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Jan. 27, 2023

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

All-formats interview with Yellen in Africa yields sharp comments on US debit limit impasse

, a treasury reporter in Washington, spent weeks negotiating a commitment for a rare all-formats interview with Janet Yellen during the treasury secretary’s visit to Africa. The interview couldn’t have happened at a better time, as Yellen took questions from AP in Senegal just two days after announcing the U.S. government had bumped up against its debt limit and would need to use “extraordinary measures” to avoid default.Read more.

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