Report on Kentucky legislator spotlights nonprofits’ role
CINCINNATI — It began from a late-night text message with a trusted source’s tip.
Seven months later, after more than 100 interviews and scouring thousands of pages of documents, a small non-profitcentre devoted to investigative reporting in Kentucky released its stunning findings on the dark history of a bombastic church pastor-turned-state legislator.
The report Monday included Rep. Dan Johnson’s links to arson cases, repeated alcohol violations in his church and the detailed story of a woman who said the pastor sexually assaulted her when she was 17. The Republican legislator elected in 2016 sharply denied the allegations on Tuesday from his Heart of Fire church’s pulpit, then fatally shot himself the next day in a secluded area.
The exhaustive expose by the Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting also spotlighted the increasing role of such non-profit, nontraditional reporting organizations in an era of shrinking newsrooms embattled by declining advertising and readership in the digital era. Newsroom surveys have estimated that more than 20,000 jobs disappeared across America in a decade’s time.