[67], Webb later moved to the State Assembly's Office of Majority Services. When Ross discovered the market for crack in Los Angeles, he began buying cocaine from Blandn. [8] In 1979, Webb married Susan Bell; the couple eventually had three children. His. 'Dark Alliance' - both as journalism and as a book - is a convoluted narrative, but the crucial link it establishes is between the "agricultural salesman" Oscar Danilo Blandn, a Contra sympathiser with close CIA links, and his best customer, an LA drug dealer known as "Freeway" Ricky Ross. Gary-Webb TL, Walker EA, Realmuto L, Kamler A, Lukin J, Tyson W, Carrasquillo O, Weiss L. Translation of the National Diabetes Prevention Program to Engage Men in Disadvantaged Neighborhoods in New York City: A Description of Power Up for Health. line-height:1.5; Meneses, an established smuggler and a Contra supporter as well, taught Blandn how to smuggle and provided him with cocaine. "You do not understand the power of these people," he adds, referring to the US intelligence services. "Although Ross had become a millionaire by 1984," Katz now wrote, "the market was so huge by then that even a dealer of his stature could seem dwarfed How the crack epidemic reached that extreme, on some level," he continues, "had nothing to do with Ross". If he could have chosen his own epitaph, it might have been a line from the letter he posted to Bell, immediately before he killed himself: "I do not regret," Webb told her, "anything that I have written." There were no offers. "[80], Not all writers agree that the Inspector-General's report supported the series's claims. Family (1) WRITTEN IN PAIN - Los Angeles Times "If I had one dream for you," he wrote, "it was that you would go into journalism and carry on the kind of work I did - fighting, with all your might, the oppression and bigotry and stupidity and greed that surrounds us. Blandn and Meneses were Nicaraguans who smuggled drugs into the U.S. and supplied dealers like Ross. The story had little immediate impact. . An investigative journalist, Webb became interested in the covert activities of the Central Intelligence Agency. Gary Webb, Into the Buzzsaw, CH 13, Prometheus Books. The couple got married recently in November of 2020 after dating for some time. The story offered no evidence to support such sweeping conclusions, a fatal error that would ultimately destroy Webb, if not his editors. Special Reports - Cocaine, Conspiracy Theories And The Cia In - PBS California senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein also took note and wrote to CIA director John Deutch and Attorney General Janet Reno, asking for investigations into the articles' allegations. It was written by Jesse Katz, the same reporter who, less than two years earlier, had described Ross's conglomerate as "the Wal-Mart of crack dealing". In February, Gary Webb gave his ex-wife. I remain astounded by the editorial decisions they made.". There has been speculation that he may have met with foul play because he had received two gunshot wounds to the head, The Sacramento Bee reported Wednesday. When they married, she was aged just 21. Famously known by the Family name Gary Stephen Webb, was a great Engineer.He was born on August 31, 1955, in Carmichael, California.Carmichael is a beautiful and populous city located in Carmichael, California United States of America.. Gary Webb Early Life Story, Family Background and Education. Do something else with your life," the voice urges. His corpse was discovered on the seventh anniversary of his resignation from the Mercury News. He was born Sept.10, 1957 in Willcox, Ariz. to RG Webb and Winnie Mae Shelton. "[64] Webb's longest response to the controversy was in "The Mighty Wurlitzer Plays On," a chapter he contributed to an anthology of press criticism: .mw-parser-output .templatequote{overflow:hidden;margin:1em 0;padding:0 40px}.mw-parser-output .templatequote .templatequotecite{line-height:1.5em;text-align:left;padding-left:1.6em;margin-top:0}, If we had met five years ago, you wouldn't have found a more staunch defender of the newspaper industry than me And then I wrote some stories that made me realize how sadly misplaced my bliss had been. She was a native of Minden, LA, but a resident of Crossett for 65 years. [71] When asked by local reporters about the possibility of two gunshots being a suicide, Lyons replied "It's unusual in a suicide case to have two shots, but it has been done in the past, and it is in fact a distinct possibility." [57], The report covered actions by Department of Justice employees in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the DEA, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and U.S. But while calling the flaws in the series "unforgivably careless journalism," Overholser also criticized the Post's refusal to print Ceppos' letter defending the series and sharply criticized the Post's coverage of the story. The article resulted in a lawsuit against Webb's paper which the plaintiffs won. Even 10 years after his tragic death, the media refuse to let him rest. When Webb pressed the Mercury News to allow him to investigate the LA connection further, his own newspaper issued a retraction which earned its editor, Jerry Ceppos, wide praise from rival publications, but effectively disowned Webb, who then suffered the kind of corporate lynching that reporters are usually expected to dispense rather than endure. By the time Webb began researching Dark Alliance, Bell was 38 and they had three children. Actor Jeremy Renner portrays Webb.[83]. The series examined the origins of the crack cocaine trade in Los Angeles and claimed that members of the anti-communist Contra rebels in Nicaragua had played a major role in creating the trade, using cocaine profits to finance their fight against the government in Nicaragua. Webb, according to Bell, was a man who, more than most, found that his mood and self-esteem fluctuated in accordance with his professional fortunes. He was a writer, known for Kill the Messenger (2014), Filming in Georgia (2015) and Crack in America (2015). "[78], While finding this part of the series unsupported, Schou said that some of the series's claims on CIA involvement are supported, writing that "The CIA conducted an internal investigation that acknowledged in March 1998 that the agency had covered up Contra drug trafficking for more than a decade." Webb put in a call to Robert Parry. "I think Kerry learnt a lesson from all this," reporter Robert Parry says. "Gary Webb was left to fend for himself. [16] As part of The Mercury News team that covered the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, Webb and his colleague Pete Carey wrote a story examining the causes of the collapse of the Cypress Street Viaduct. Gary Webb's family says his death was Suicide. Investigative journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of stories in 1996 for the San Jose Mercury News that documented the US-government-backed Contra insurgents' drug pipeline into Los Angeles. Gary Webb's "Approach Split" in the atrium of 20 Triton Street London. Despite some hyped phrasing, "Dark Alliance" appears to be praiseworthy investigative reporting."[47]. Should these editors subsequently deem the story to have been fatally flawed, they take the consequences. Critics view the series' claims as inaccurate or overstated, while supporters point to the results of a later CIA investigation as vindicating the series. News coverage noted that there were widespread rumors on the Internet at the time that Webb had been killed as retribution for his "Dark Alliance" series, published eight years before. While working at the legislature, Webb continued to do freelance investigative reporting, sometimes based on his investigative work. It concluded, however, that these problems were "a far cry from the type of broad manipulation and corruption of the federal criminal justice system suggested by the original allegations.". Jeff Leen, assistant managing editor for investigative reporting at The Washington Post, wrote in a 2014 opinion page article that "the report found no CIA relationship with the drug ring Webb had written about." According to a description of Webb's injuries in the Los Angeles Times, he shot himself with a .38 revolver, which he placed near his right ear. Gary Webb's Ex-Wife Set to Attend New York Premiere By Richard Horgan October 8, 2014 Cleveland Plain Dealer film critic Clint O'Connor had a solid feature the other day about Kill the. "[38], Surprised by The Washington Post article, The Mercury News's executive editor Jerome Ceppos wrote to the Post defending the series. He cites the case of Alfred McCoy, now Professor of South East Asian Studies at the University of Wisconsin. "Exactly," replied Kornbluh, who - referring specifically to the LA Times, said he is "baffled as to how they could be so gullible. Within weeks, the site was attracting up to 1.3m hits per day. The consensus, insofar as one exists, is that he probably overstated both the amount of drug money made by Ross and Blandn, and the percentage of those profits diverted to the Contras. "You sound very scared," Moreira remarks. [4] When Webb's father retired from the Marines, the family settled in a suburb of Indianapolis, where Webb and his brother attended high school. She was a homemaker and a member of Hunters Chapel Baptist Church. When Attorney General Janet Reno determined that a delay was no longer necessary, the report was released unaltered. The series ran from October 2022, 1996, and was researched by a team of 17 reporters. He concluded, "How did these shortcomings occur? Shortly before I left for Sacramento, Moreira, who knew Webb, had shown me unbroadcast footage which shows the French reporter making a phone call to a media commentator in the US, asking him about Webb's death. Why Journalist Gary Webb Died - LewRockwell "[55] In June 1997, The Mercury News told Webb it was transferring him from the paper's Sacramento bureau and offered him a choice between working at the main offices in San Jose under closer editorial supervision, or spot reporting in Cupertino; both locations were long commutes from his home in Sacramento. Webb established incontrovertible links * between Ricky Ross and Blandn who, two years later, would betray Ross to the authorities. But the biggest loss he had was the writing. And "we really didn't do anything to advance his work or illuminate much to the story, and it was a really kind of tawdry exercise. Webb chose the second option. Gary's ex-wife Susan Bell states: "The way he was acting it would be hard for me to believe it was anything but suicide." An interesting OPINION, but she supplies no convincing evidence to illustrate what she means by this. [21] This artwork proved controversial, and The Mercury News later removed it. Gary Webb was born on August 31, 1955 in Corona, California, USA. Gary Webb - Lake Ridge Chapel & Memorial Designers Nobody who heads a government agency can let such an allegation stand.". "Like enjoy it.". Contemporary discussions of the series are discussed in the section on, Webb 2011, "Caltrans Ignored Elevated Freeway Safety. According to Schou, the investigation "confirmed key chunks of Webb's allegations." Bell and her children helped Webb prepare 50 packages containing cuttings and his CV which they sent out to newspapers all over the US. The drugs went to South Central LA. Webb moved his wife and two young children to a suburb and continued a tradition he had started in Cleveland, restoring their small house with the help of how-to books, installing wainscoting and custom tile, new cabinets and gardens, while putting in overtime at the paper. font-weight:500; [40] Ceppos also asked reporter Pete Carey to write a critique of the series for publication in The Mercury News, and had the controversial website artwork changed. "The second bullet," adds Bell, who has worked for more than 20 years in the area of respiratory therapy, "struck his carotid artery. In 1996, the award-winning journalist Gary Webb uncovered CIA links to Los Angeles drug dealers. Writing on the Los Angeles Times opinion page, Schou said, "Webb asserted, improbably, that the Blandn-Meneses-Ross drug ring opened 'the first pipeline between Colombia's cocaine cartels and the black neighborhoods of Los Angeles,' helping to 'spark a crack explosion in urban America.' The room is decorated with his trophies: a Pulitzer prize hangs next to his HL Mencken award; also on the wall is a framed advertisement for The Kentucky Post. Every year since investigative journalist Gary Webb took his own life in 2004, I have marked the anniversary of that sad event by recalling the debt that American history owes to Webb for his. He was sentenced to life in prison, though the sentence was shortened on appeal and Ross was released in 2009. "People told me that," she says. [46] Overholser was harshly critical of the series, "reported by a seemingly hotheaded fellow willing to have people leap to conclusions his reporting couldn't back up." Shortly before his death, his motorcycle had been stolen (it was recovered by his family after his death). "Which was that, if he wanted a future within the political establishment of the United States, then he should concentrate on other aspects of life.". What was new about Webb's reports, published under the title "Dark Alliance" in the Californian paper the San Jose Mercury News, was that for the first time it brought the story back home. In 2004, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb was found dead from an apparent suicide, as Democracy Now! [52] Webb was allowed to keep working on the story and made one more trip to Nicaragua in March. [55] Webb eventually chose Cupertino, but was unhappy with the routine stories he was reporting there and the long commute. "Gary didn't take her seriously," says Susan Bell, "because he was always getting calls alleging weird stuff about the CIA. Gary Webb - Biography - IMDb Gary Webb, 64, Oroville, Wash., died Oct. 30, 2021. It was published in 1998 as Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. By the late spring of 1996, Webb was ready to publish. This emotive last phrase refers to Webb's experience in the immediate aftermath of publication of his three lengthy articles, in the summer of 1996. "I had to warn Gary that what he was looking at was probably true, but that he would run very big risks," Parry recalls. We had this huge team of people at the L.A. Times and kind of piled on to one lone muckraker up in Northern California." He died by suicide on December 10, 2004. His father was a Marine sergeant, and the family moved frequently, as his career took him to new assignments. In 1997 Ceppos was awarded the US Society of Professional Journalists' National Ethics Award. reports. Ceppos failed to reply to one phone message and six emails. Gary Webb was at his desk in the Mercury News's Sacramento office, in July 1995, when he received a message to call Coral Baca, a Hispanic woman from the San Francisco Bay area, allegedly connected to a Colombian drug cartel. [72] A New York Times profile of Webb in June 1997 noted that two of his series written for the Cleveland Plain Dealer had resulted in lawsuits that the paper had settled. "Gary was given the choice of relocating either to San Jose," says Bell, "or to Cupertino". Webb had become, as somebody put it, "radioactive". By the end of September, three federal investigations had been announced: an investigation into the CIA allegations conducted by CIA Inspector-General Frederick Hitz, an investigation into the law enforcement allegations by Justice Department Inspector-General Michael Bromwich, and a second investigation into the CIA by the House Intelligence Committee. In an unprecedented move, the then CIA director John Deutch was dispatched to address community leaders in the Watts district of LA. "He had six in a short period of time." By this stage, he was prepared to work as a jobbing reporter. The response from the American press took two months to arrive. He was laid off in February 2004 when Assembly Member Fabian Nez was elected Speaker. Its pointed to as one of the clearer cases of CIA intervention as revenge for Webb revealing damaging secrets about the agencies involvement in drug smuggling. Noting that most of the activities discussed in the report had nothing to do with the people Webb reported on, Kornbluh told Schou, "I can't say it's a vindication. [49], The paper also gave Webb permission to visit Central America again to get more evidence supporting the story. Gary Webb : Murdered For Exposing The Truth - Educate Inspire Change Start your Independent Premium subscription today. A passing motorist - a heavily tattooed young man - gave him a lift home, then returned and stole the motorcycle, which police recovered from him three days after Webb's death. [60], It found nothing to support the claim that "the drug trafficking activities of Blandn and Meneses were motivated by any commitment to support the Contra cause or Contra activities undertaken by CIA." Gary Webb Obituary (2011) - Saginaw, MI - Saginaw News on MLive.com [73], On the other hand, many of the writers and editors who worked with him have had high praise for him. He crashed and shredded his clothes, face and body on a barbed-wire fence." Emma Lee Webb of Crossett, Arkansas | 1947 - 2023 | Obituary "[77], Webb's reporting in "Dark Alliance" remains controversial. He also defended the series in interviews with all three papers. It's . Carey ultimately decided that there were problems with several parts of the story and wrote a draft article incorporating his findings. When his medical insurance expired, he stopped taking his antidepressants. "[75], Jonathan Krim, The Mercury News editor who recruited Webb from The Plain Dealer and who supervised The Mercury News internal review of "Dark Alliance," told AJR editor Paterno that Webb "had all the qualities you'd want in a reporter: curious, dogged, a very high sense of wanting to expose wrongdoing and to hold private and public officials accountable." Maxine Waters found a govt employee ran the South Central LA drug ring & The DOJ removed that section of the report : r/conspiracy 3 yr. ago Posted by shylock92008 color: #ddd; Gary Webb - Spartacus Educational He was so depressed. For two years, Blum and Kerry supervised the interrogation of dozens of witnesses who described CIA-related drug deals in central America. Gary Webb famously died of two gun shot wounds to the head and his death that was ruled a suicide, is the common sense notion that this was clearly assassination true? His own paper, the Mercury News, criticized the series in 1997 without providing many specifics. And yet, for all his Easy Rider tendencies, he was also a dedicated family man with an extraordinary appetite for researching minutiae. Corrie had primary biliary cirrhosis, a genetic liver disease that already had. Gary Webb FRCPC Obituary (1943 - 2021) - Legacy Remembers The character reporter Irene Abe is said by fans of the show to be a stand in character for the real life Gary Webb. Gary's family found that old, storied, ("priceless to us," as his ex-wife, Susan Bell, described it to me) CDROM among his possessions. Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? The complete lack of desire to ask the difficult questions makes me want to scream. [66] Occupation: Machine Operators, Assemblers, and Inspectors Occupations. The CIA Inspector General's report, commissioned in response to the allegations in "Dark Alliance", was published in the autumn of 1998. We are in the living room of Bell's house just outside Sacramento, California. The attack on Gary Webb and his series in the San Jose Mercury News remains one of the most venomous and factually inane assaults on a professional journalist's competence in living memory . Gary Webb | Okanogan Valley Gazette-Tribune [36] McManus wrote that Blandn's and Meneses's contributions to Contra organizations were significantly less than the "millions" claimed in the series, and stated there was no evidence that the CIA had tried to protect them. [10] The series, which examined the murder of a coal company president with ties to organized crime, won the national Investigative Reporters and Editors Award for reporting from a small newspaper. During and immediately after the controversy over "Dark Alliance," Webb's earlier writing was examined closely. He was assigned to its Sacramento bureau, where he was allowed to choose most of his own stories. Gary Webb photos on Flickr | Flickr "As a PhD student, McCoy went to Vietnam and built an absolutely damning case about the CIA's involvement with trafficking heroin. . An editorial in the Times, while criticizing the series for making "unsubstantiated charges", conceded that it did find "drug-smuggling and dealing by Nicaraguans with at least tentative connections to the Contras" and called for further investigation. It found that Blandn received permanent resident status "in a wholly improper manner" and that for some time the Department "was not certain whether to prosecute Meneses, or use him as a cooperating witness." "But that," pointed out Blum, who is now a Washington attorney, "in no way - in no way - diminishes the wrongness of what these bastards did. It was accurate. Webb, Bell explains, had written four letters explaining what he was about to do - one to her, one to each of their three children - and mailed them immediately before he killed himself. In August of 1996, investigative journalist Gary Webb broke the biggest story of his life. In addition, Gary left multiple suicide notes to family members which were confirmed to be in his own hand by them. Ceppos initially defended Webb, and reportedly showed up at an in-house party wearing a military helmet. The series revolves around the first crack epidemic and its impact on the culture of the city. After Webb's death, a collection of his stories from before and after the "Dark Alliance" series was published. But Webb had one huge blind side: He was fundamentally a man of passion, not of fairness. The link between drug-running and the Reagan regime's support for the right-wing terrorist group throughout the 1980s had been public knowledge for over a decade. But, Ceppos wrote, the series "did not meet our standards" in four areas. The story was picked up by black talk-radio stations. The third article discussed the social effects of the crack trade, noting that it had a disparate effect on African-Americans. The story they printed was just awful. [43] He did this in a column that appeared on November 3, defending the series, but also committing the paper to a review of major criticisms. He said: 'No. His victory in the event last year gave him . The "Dark Alliance" series remains controversial. Webb, Gary Gary T. Webb, age 67, of Hamilton, Michigan, passed away peacefully surrounded by his loving family Thursday, November 11, 2021. Call 911 for assistance. [51] After discussions with Webb, the column was published on May 11, 1997.[53]. Both sides were left angry and disappointed. . While police were preparing the case against her boyfriend, Baca alleged, officers had disclosed documents which revealed that one of her lover's associates had been working for the Contras. Gary is survived by his loving wife of 41 years, Barbara; their son, Jeff; his nephew, Christopher (Stephanie) Webb; niece, Sara (Gary) Dugan; and . And it was ignored by the US media, for all of those reasons. [33] Golden also referred to the controversy over Webb's contacts with Ross's lawyer. Gary Webb | Obituary | The Daily Item * The agency's response was to try to prevent him from getting his doctorate, then block his advancement in the academic world. Talking about his wife, Mariah Webb is a nurse who also educates about essential products . ", In contrast, the series received support from Steve Weinberg, a former executive director of Investigative Reporters and Editors. [62], Examining the support that Meneses and Blandn gave to the local Contra organization in San Francisco, the report concluded that it was "not sufficient to finance the organization" and did not consist of "millions," contrary to the claims of the "Dark Alliance" series. Save 50% with early-bird passes. Vivian Corrie, a part of his liver in a life-threatening operation. [6], Webb first began writing for the student newspaper at his college in Indianapolis. He was born August 27, 1968 in Saginaw, Michigan to Taylor Jr. and Loretta Webb. [42] The extent of the criticism, however, convinced Ceppos that The Mercury News had to acknowledge to its readers that the series had been subjected to strong criticism. This drug ring "opened the first pipeline between Colombia's cocaine cartels and the black neighborhoods of Los Angeles" and, as a result, "The cocaine that flooded in helped spark a crack explosion in urban America."[23]. The first detailed article on the series's claims appeared in The Washington Post in early October. He stayed home, playing computer games, and began smoking cannabis heavily. That wouldn't have happened if he hadn't been willing to stand up and risk it all.". 2) The series's estimate of the money involved was presented as fact instead of as an estimate. Gary Hays Webb, 78, passed away on Monday May 9, 2022, at ThedaCare Regional Medical Center, Neenah. [51], The editors met with Webb several times in February to discuss the results of the paper's internal review and eventually decided to print neither Carey's draft article nor the articles Webb had filed. The article discussed Webb's contacts with Ross's attorney and prosecution complaints of how Ross's defense had used Webb's series.