![]() First edition | |
Author | Wendy Ruderman and Barbara Laker |
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Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | Crime |
Published | March 11, 2014 |
Publisher | HarperCollins |
ISBN | 9780062085443 |
Busted: A Tale of Corruption and Betrayal in the City of Brotherly Love is a 2014 non-fiction book by Wendy Ruderman and Barbara Laker. The book details the true tale of how Ruderman and Laker, two reporters at the Philadelphia Daily News , led an investigation into police corruption in Philadelphia. This book shows the back story of the "Tainted Justice" investigation which earned the women a Pulitzer Prize in 2010 for investigative reporting.
At the time of the investigation, the newspaper was in deep financial trouble. The company, which also owns the Philadelphia Inquirer, only had one lawyer at the time. The lawyer was bogged down with other legal proceedings and was unable to offer too much help to the women. So instead, when the city refused to give them access to search warrants, Ruderman and Laker convinced the custodian of the records on Christmas Eve to let them access the records. [1]
The investigation was quite the controversy in Philadelphia. In part, that was because several police officers died in the line of duty leading up to the investigation, which made people already more sensitive to police at that time. [1]
After the investigation trickled out through the tabloid over a few months, hundreds of drug cases in the city had been re-examined out and some were thrown out. Philadelphia police also launched a task force with the FBI, the department's Internal Affairs division and the city's Inspector General's Office, to investigate the incidents. [2] As of May 10[ when? ], five officers involved with the allegations were on desk duty and more than 15 civil suits had been filed in federal court.
Federal and local prosecutors decided not to press any charges against the four officers who were accused of lying about evidence on search warrants and stealing from corner drug stores—one of the officers was accused of sexually assaulting at least three women. [3]
In July 2014, the president of Philadelphia's Fraternal Order of Police, John McNesby, demanded an investigation into how Ruderman and Laker interacted with the sources used during their "Tainted Justice" investigation. According to a NewsWorks report at the time, McNesby suggested that the reporters "may have given money, paid utility bills and provided diapers to sources who accused the offers at the center of the 2009 series." [4] McNesby said the Pulitzer Prize should be revoked from the women.
A video [5] from a staff member at the Daily News shows the two women jumping wildly up and down after learning they had won. Ruderman is seen opening a small bottle of champagne, pouring it into her tennis shoe and drinking it. [6] She later called this a reference to "shoe leather" journalism.
Rosella Elanor Lafevre praised the book in a review for the Philadelphia magazine, writing:
It’s a captivating story that I tore through in two days. There are moments that inspire riotous laughter and quiet awe, and some that will make your skin crawl. It gives as much proof to the importance of hard-working reporters in a one-party town as it does the importance of chasing your dreams, even when they seem preposterous. [7]
In the May 23, 2014, edition of the New York Times' Sunday Book Review, Charles Graeber offered this short take on the book:
This is a shoe-leather journalistic procedural set against the ticking clock of the failing newspaper industry. The book is sometimes a bit self-conscious about its buddy movie potential, but it’s impossible not to root for the self-described “slime sistas” as they follow up on a series of tips about a Philly police squad that regularly robbed immigrant-owned bodegas, and a badge-wielding sexual predator known only as “the Boob Man.” [8]
The Washington Post's Melinda Henneberger compared the two women to Thelma and Louise in a story appearing in the April 2, 2014, edition of the newspaper's style section:
The new book... is the chick, noir version of “All the President’s Men,” with a little “Rocky,” a little “Deadline U.S.A.” and a little almost anything with Rosalind Russell or Barbara Stanwyck. [9]
Many have compared Ruderman and Laker to Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the journalists behind Watergate and co-authors of All the President's Men . In a column for the Columbia Journalism review, Anna Clark draws similar parallels:
The effect is a little jarring for a co-written book, but it does have the immediacy that comes with first-person narrative, while avoiding the flattening effect of a “we” voice stretching for hundreds of pages. (For the record, Woodward and Bernstein in All The President’s Men opted for a third-person narrator who knows the reporters’ thoughts, a choice that comes with its own idiosyncrasies: “ ’Oh god, not Bernstein,’ Woodward thought . . . .”) [1]
In June 2014, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment considered developing an hour-long, limited television series based on the book. [10] Sex and the City's Sarah Jessica Parker was reported to be attached to the project as one of two leads. Parker spent time in Philadelphia shadowing Ruderman in preparation for the role. [11] David Frankel, director of 2006's The Devil Wears Prada , was brought on to direct the television series along with Carla Hacken, president of production at SKE, who is supposed to produce it.
All the President's Men is a 1974 non-fiction book by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, two of the journalists who investigated the June 1972 break-in at the Watergate Office Building and the resultant political scandal for The Washington Post. The book chronicles the investigative reporting of Woodward and Bernstein from Woodward's initial report on the Watergate break-in through the resignations of Nixon Administration officials H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman in April 1973, and the revelation of the Oval Office Watergate tapes by Alexander Butterfield three months later. It relates the events behind the major stories the duo wrote for the Post, naming some sources who had previously refused to be identified for their initial articles, notably Hugh Sloan. It also gives detailed accounts of Woodward's secret meetings with his source Deep Throat, whose identity was kept hidden for over 30 years. Gene Roberts, the former executive editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer and former managing editor of The New York Times, has called the work of Woodward and Bernstein "maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time."
Robert Upshur Woodward is an American investigative journalist. He started working for The Washington Post as a reporter in 1971 and now holds the title of associate editor.
Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, such as serious crimes, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years researching and preparing a report. Practitioners sometimes use the terms "watchdog reporting" or "accountability reporting."
Deep Throat is the pseudonym given to the secret informant who provided information in 1972 to Bob Woodward, who shared it with Carl Bernstein. Woodward and Bernstein were reporters for The Washington Post, and Deep Throat provided key details about the involvement of U.S. president Richard Nixon's administration in what came to be known as the Watergate scandal. In 2005, 31 years after Nixon's resignation and 11 years after Nixon's death, a family attorney stated that former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Associate Director Mark Felt was Deep Throat. By then, Felt was suffering from dementia and had previously denied being Deep Throat, but Woodward and Bernstein then confirmed the attorney's claim.
The Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting has been awarded since 1953, under one name or another, for a distinguished example of investigative reporting by an individual or team, presented as a single article or series in a U.S. news publication. It is administered by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York City.
The Pulitzer Prize for Public Service is one of the fourteen American Pulitzer Prizes annually awarded for journalism. It recognizes a distinguished example of meritorious public service by a newspaper or news site through the use of its journalistic resources, which may include editorials, cartoons, photographs, graphics, video and other online material, and may be presented in print or online or both.
The Philadelphia Police Department is the police agency responsible for law enforcement and investigations within the City of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The PPD is one of the oldest municipal police agencies, fourth largest police force and sixth largest non-federal law enforcement agency in the United States. Since records were first kept in 1828, at least 289 PPD officers have died in the line of duty.
Philadelphia Daily News is a tabloid newspaper that serves Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The newspaper is owned by The Philadelphia Inquirer, LLC, which also owns Philadelphia's other major newspaper The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Dana Louise Priest is an American journalist, writer and teacher. She has worked for nearly 30 years for the Washington Post and became the third John S. and James L. Knight Chair in Public Affairs Journalism at the University of Maryland's Philip Merrill College of Journalism in 2014. Before becoming a full-time investigative reporter at the Post, Priest specialized in intelligence reporting and wrote many articles on the U.S. "War on terror" and was the newspaper's Pentagon correspondent. In 2006 she won the Pulitzer Prize for Beat Reporting citing "her persistent, painstaking reports on secret "black site" prisons and other controversial features of the government's counter-terrorism campaign." The Washington Post won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, citing the work of reporters Priest and Anne Hull and photographer Michel du Cille "exposing mistreatment of wounded veterans at Walter Reed Hospital, evoking a national outcry and producing reforms by federal officials."
The Philip Merrill College of Journalism is a journalism school located at the University of Maryland, College Park. The college was founded in 1947 and was named after newspaper editor Philip Merrill in 2001. The school has about 550 undergraduates and 70 graduate students enrolled.
The Virgin Islands Daily News is a daily newspaper in the United States Virgin Islands headquartered on the island of Saint Thomas. In 1995 the newspaper became one of the smallest ever to win journalism's most prestigious award, the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. The newspaper is published every day except Sunday. The paper maintains its main office on Saint Thomas and a smaller bureau on Saint Croix.
Sidney Kimmel Entertainment is an American financer, film and television production company founded in 2004 by philanthropist and film producer Sidney Kimmel. Sidney Kimmel Entertainment focuses on bringing entertainment projects to audiences in association with studio distribution partners.
Gar Joseph was a prominent journalist in Pennsylvania, USA, working for the Philadelphia Daily News. Joseph had been city editor of the Daily News since December 2005.
Christopher S. Stewart is an American author and investigative reporter for The Wall Street Journal, which he joined in 2011. In 2015, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Investigative reporting with several colleagues for a series of articles exposing abuses in the Medicare system.
The 2010 Pulitzer Prizes were awarded on Monday, April 12, 2010. In journalism, The Washington Post won four awards while The New York Times won three. For the first time, an online source, ProPublica, won in what had previously been the sole province of print. A musical, Next to Normal, won the Drama award for the first time in 14 years. Country singer-songwriter Hank Williams, who died at age 29 in 1953, received a special citation. Below, the winner(s) in each category are listed.
Paul Pringle is an American investigative journalist for the Los Angeles Times and author of the 2022 book Bad City: Peril and Power in the City of Angels.
Barbara Laker is an American journalist for the Philadelphia Daily News. She won with Wendy Ruderman the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting.
Wendy Ruderman is an American journalist for the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News. She won with Barbara Laker the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting. Ruderman, along with Inquirer colleagues Barbara Laker and Dylan Purcell, was named a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer for local reporting for “Toxic City: Sick Schools,” which examined how environmental hazards in Philadelphia schools deprive children of healthy spaces to learn and grow.
Matt Apuzzo is an American journalist.
Elsa Walsh is an American journalist and author. In 1989 she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and she released her book Divided Lives: The Public and Private Struggles of 3 Accomplished Women in 1995. Walsh has worked for both The Washington Post and The New Yorker.