In August 2018, Gary Harki and his O鈥橞rien student intern team published a multimedia series and database called 鈥�鈥� in The Virginian-Pilot.
The first-of-its-kind series drew from news reports, existing databases and court filings to identify 404 deaths of people with mental illness in jails across the nation since 2010. The resulting dataset revealed that in jails around the country, people with mental illnesses are routinely dying in horrific and preventable ways.
Harki and his team published several stories highlighting specific trends in their data. They also worked with former Virginian-Pilot Interactive Graphics Editor Will Houp to design data visualizations, and an that allows readers to filter and read about individual cases based on different criteria.
Marquette student journalists Alexandria Bursiek, Rebecca Carballo and Diana Dombrowski received byline credit for the series in addition to writing their own sidebar pieces. They played key roles in researching and reporting the series over two semesters and went on out-of-town reporting trips during their winter and spring breaks.
The series won the , which is co-sponsored by the Denver Press Club and the University of Colorado Boulder's College of Media, Communication and Information. It was also a by the News Leaders Association (formerly the American Society of News Editors and the Associated Press Media Editors).
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