.article-native-ad svg { Webb was an assertive figure who drove fast cars and powerful motorcycles, hung heavy metal posters in his office and, at certain times in his life, smoked a fair amount of cannabis. He was born June 18, 1943, in Appleton, son of the late Wilford and Helen (Hauskey) Webb. The Mercury News reporter came under sustained attack from the weightier US newspapers such as The New York Times, The Washington Post and, especially, the Los Angeles Times, infuriated at being scooped, on its own patch, by what it saw as a small-town paper. }. The first article, by Katz, developed a different picture of the origins of the crack trade than "Dark Alliance" had described, with more gangs and smugglers participating. His father was a Marine sergeant, and the family moved frequently, as his career took him to new assignments. margin-top: 10px; "As a PhD student, McCoy went to Vietnam and built an absolutely damning case about the CIA's involvement with trafficking heroin. Gary Hays (304) 778-7090: He began his career working for newspapers in Kentucky and Ohio, winning numerous awards, and building a strong reputation for investigative writing. [60], The House Intelligence Committee issued its report in February 2000. Born in Corona, California, son of a conservatively minded Marine, he met Bell, whose father was a university lecturer, at high school in Indianapolis. Do not quote me on anything.". It sounds like a Tom Clancy novel, right? ", In contrast, the series received support from Steve Weinberg, a former executive director of Investigative Reporters and Editors. But "Dark Alliance" was also posted on the Mercury News's website, with the image of a crack smoker superimposed on the CIA badge. The reports rejected the series's main claims but were critical of some CIA and law enforcement actions. He was the much-loved father of Lindsay (Stephen . .article-native-ad p { Because Blandn cooperated with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), he spent only 28 months in prison, became a paid government informant, and received permanent resident status. When he was engaged, he worked hard. In the final few months of his life, Bell says, Webb became increasingly withdrawn. He also had this inherent belief that the truth could not harm him. 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.". He leaves behind the love of his life and adoring wife of 41 years, Anne Michelle Phillips. The third article discussed the social effects of the crack trade, noting that it had a disparate effect on African-Americans. Although he attended Northern Kentucky for four years, he did not finish his degree. On the last day Webb was alive, his motorbike broke down while he was moving to his mother's house. [18], Webb began researching "Dark Alliance" in July 1995. "Because of Gary Webb's work," said Senator John Kerry, "the CIA launched an investigation that found dozens of connections to drug runners. Although it did find that both men were major drug dealers, "guilty of enriching themselves at the expense of countless drug users," and that they had contributed money to the Contra cause, "we did not find that their activities were responsible for the crack cocaine epidemic in South Central Los Angeles, much less the rise of crack throughout the nation, or that they were a significant source of support for the Contras. 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. Emma Lee Webb. "Everyone got out and left the person who had made the noise - issued the report - alone. The other article, citing interviews with current and former intelligence and law-enforcement officials, questioned the importance of the drug dealers discussed in the series, both in the crack cocaine trade and in supporting the Nicaraguan Contras' fight against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. By 1997, Bell tells me, Webb - whose 30-year career had earned him more awards than there is room for in her study - had been reassigned to the Mercury News's office in Cupertino. in Central America", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gary_Webb&oldid=1138520387, This page was last edited on 10 February 2023, at 03:36. According to the report, the Inspector-General's office (OIG) examined all information the agency had "relating to CIA knowledge of drug trafficking allegations in regard to any person directly or indirectly involved in Contra activities." It would have been our 25th wedding anniversary," Bell recalls. There were no offers. But you say - dear God. 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. Part of what makes OConnors article so compelling are the candid thoughts of Webbs former wife Sue Stokes. It also examined "how CIA handled and responded to information regarding allegations of drug trafficking" by people involved in Contra activities or support. color:rgb(46,179,178); Despite some hyped phrasing, "Dark Alliance" appears to be praiseworthy investigative reporting."[47]. 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. "[25] It also found disparities in the treatment of Black and White traffickers in the justice system, contrasting the treatment of Blandn and Ross after their arrests for drug trafficking. Webb, Gary Gary T. Webb, age 67, of Hamilton, Michigan, passed away peacefully surrounded by his loving family Thursday, November 11, 2021. "The first story he had to file was about a police horse which had died of constipation.". Pictured as a teenage fan: Gary Numan with Gemma, his now wife, getting his autograph in 1985 years before they got together Gary was 600,000 in debt, and on the verge of going under in. Garry Webb wrote the 1996 "Dark Alliance" series for the San Jose. .article-native-ad strong { Gary Webb's family says his death was Suicide. "He rang me up that day. Some editors regarded him as stubborn to the point of insolence. Film of this encounter survives. [26] Other papers were slow to pick up the story, but African Americans quickly took note, especially in South Central Los Angeles where the dealers discussed in the series had been active. The legendary civil-rights activist Dick Gregory was arrested while he protested outside the CIA's headquarters; Gregory began referring to the organisation as "Crack in America". 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 was previously married to Sue Bell. A series of expose articles in the San Jose Mercury-News by reporter Gary Webb told tales of a drug triangle during the 1980s that linked CIA officials in Central America, a San Francisco drug . He is survived by his loving wife, Wendie, of Elgin; grandmother, Eileen Carrier of Elgin;. * The agency's response was to try to prevent him from getting his doctorate, then block his advancement in the academic world. After the publication of "Dark Alliance," The Mercury News continued to pursue the story, publishing follow-ups to the original series for the next three months. [33] Golden also referred to the controversy over Webb's contacts with Ross's lawyer. [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." There was no coffin, casket or tombstone. Webb is best known for his "Dark Alliance" series, which appeared in The Mercury News in 1996. Gary Webb, Into the Buzzsaw, CH 13, Prometheus Books. But the tragedy had a deeper meaning. "[77], Webb's reporting in "Dark Alliance" remains controversial. Relationships with other women ended badly. Gary Webb, friends say, was a far more combative character than either the Mercury News's executive editor Ceppos or page editor Garcia. He was assigned to its Sacramento bureau, where he was allowed to choose most of his own stories. By the time Webb began researching Dark Alliance, Bell was 38 and they had three children. He said: 'No. A time of fellowship and remembrance is scheduled from 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, March 6, 2019, at Lake Ridge Chapel and Memorial Designers. 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." "[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. But, Ceppos wrote, the series "did not meet our standards" in four areas. It found that "the allegations contained in the original Mercury News articles were exaggerations of the actual facts." [35] The second article, by McManus, was the longest of the series and dealt with the role of the Contras in the drug trade and CIA knowledge of drug activities by the Contras. In and out of work, he had a reputation for taking risks. "But Gary thought that if something was true, it should be told. Attorneys' Offices. Age 43 years. "I think the behaviour of the media in all of this has been amazing," says Bell. Instead, he found work in 1978 as a reporter at the Kentucky Post, a local paper affiliated with the larger Cincinnati Post. [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. He was preceded in death by his wife, Melody Webb; parents and three brothers, Albert, Duane and Ronald. So, how much is Gary Webb worth at the age of 49 years old? Webb's ex-wife, Stokes, now remarried and still living in Sacramento, had heard it all before, too. When Webb wrote another story on the raid evidence in early October, it received wide attention in Los Angeles. Webb established incontrovertible links * between Ricky Ross and Blandn who, two years later, would betray Ross to the authorities. "They tried to make us look like crazies," says Blum. The response from the American press took two months to arrive. 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. Hired by the San Jose Mercury News, Webb contributed to the paper's Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. Webb became a staff reporter for the San Jose Mercury News in 1988. His victory in the event last year gave him . 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. A revised version was published in 1999 that incorporated Webb's response to the CIA and Justice Department reports. In the column, Ceppos defended parts of the article, writing that the series had "solidly documented" that the drug ring described in the series did have connections with the Contras and did sell large quantities of cocaine in inner-city Los Angeles. [55] Webb eventually chose Cupertino, but was unhappy with the routine stories he was reporting there and the long commute. He went into the bedroom, and picked up a .38 that had belonged to his father. He then transferred to nearby Northern Kentucky University. One instalment of the LA Times's 18,000-word rebuttal of Webb's piece, published in October 1996, sought to minimise the importance of his key witness, Ricky Ross. The film broadened the debate which led to the decriminalisation of . 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." [5], After high school, Webb attended an Indianapolis community college on a scholarship until his family moved to Cincinnati. By the autumn of 1997, on medication for clinical depression, he was given leave of absence from the paper. His was the story of a man who gains information of wrongdoing, then, attempting to act in the public interest, seeks protection from his superiors, and the forces of law, and does not receive it. In addition, Gary left multiple suicide notes to family members which were confirmed to be in his own hand by them. Family (1) And it ruined that reporter's career. The third article, by Mitchell and Fulwood, covered the effects of crack on African-Americans and how it affected their reaction to some of the rumors that arose after the "Dark Alliance" series. By: E&P Staff The death of investigative reporter Gary Webb has been confirmed as a suicide, according to a coroner's statement. Newsweek called Kerry a "randy conspiracy buff". [49], The paper also gave Webb permission to visit Central America again to get more evidence supporting the story. "[58], It also concluded that "the claims that Blandn and Meneses were responsible for introducing crack cocaine into South Central Los Angeles and spreading the crack epidemic throughout the country were unsupported." In August of 1996, investigative journalist Gary Webb broke the biggest story of his life. As a result, some major US newspapers ignored its findings completely, while others relegated a brief summary to their inside pages. Nobody who heads a government agency can let such an allegation stand.". line-height:1.5; In city after city, local dealers either bought from Ross or got left behind."[24]. "This is an appalling charge," says a tense-looking Deutch. He concluded, "How did these shortcomings occur? Both Gary's ex-wife Susan and his brother Kurt viewed the body and they confirmed the location of the wounds to me when I met them. The first one, "The California Story," was issued in a classified version on December 17, 1997, and in an unclassified version on January 29, 1998. "Gary Webb was left to fend for himself. Do something else with your life," the voice urges. It noted that Blandn and Meneses claimed to have donated money to Contra sympathizers in Los Angeles, but found no information to confirm that it was true or that the agency had heard of it. "I believe that Americans, as a nation, are mainly concerned with living their happy little lives. "[82], Kill the Messenger (2014) is based on Webb's book Dark Alliance and Nick Schou's biography of Webb. So he blew her off. In 2004, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb was found dead from an apparent suicide, as Democracy Now! "By the end of his life he was just in a lot of pain," said Webb's ex-wife, Susan Bell. Thank you." At that time, Webb (pictured) was best known for the controversial three-part CIA 1996 expose he wrote the San Jose Mercury News called "Dark Alliance: The Story Behind the . Gary Webb was a journalist of outsized talent. When he was engaged, he worked hard. OR was he like Epstein? "He was sleeping more, he hated to get up in the morning, he started having a lot of motorcycle. "The cause of death was determined to be self . His own paper, the Mercury News, criticized the series in 1997 without providing many specifics. Contemporary discussions of the series are discussed in the section on, Webb 2011, "Caltrans Ignored Elevated Freeway Safety. Webb, unlike Blum or Kerry, had to face his difficulties alone. He was found dead on Friday morning in what the police said was an apparent suicide. "They had him writing obituaries," she said. [61] According to the report, it used Webb's reporting and writing as "key resources in focusing and refining the investigation." "[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. ", Many of these are in the series archive at. 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 1996, the award-winning journalist Gary Webb uncovered CIA links to Los Angeles drug dealers. "They use the giant corporate press rather than saying anything directly. GARY WEBB OBITUARY Gary Frank Webb Sept. 27, 1944 - Oct. 23, 2022 Gary passed away peacefully of complications following cardiovascular surgery. He was sentenced to life in prison, though the sentence was shortened on appeal and Ross was released in 2009. The normal process is, or should be, that a reporter files a story and is robustly challenged by his paper's lawyers and editors - who, if satisfied that the report is accurate - publish, then defend the writer to the hilt. Talking about his wife, Mariah Webb is a nurse who also educates about essential products . An investigative journalist, Webb became interested in the covert activities of the Central Intelligence Agency. "The government side of the story is coming through the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Washington Post", he stated. 71K views 8 years ago Gary Webb's son Ian talks about the film in which Jeremy Renner plays his late journalist father. Save 50% with early-bird passes. According to Walt Bogdanich, a former colleague on the Plain Dealer who has won two Pulitzers and now works for The New York Times, Webb was the best retriever of information from public records he has ever seen. The story was picked up by black talk-radio stations. Regarding issues raised in the series's shorter sidebar stories, it found that some in the government were "not eager" to have DEA agent Celerino Castillo "openly probe" activities at Ilopango Airport in El Salvador, where covert operations in support of the Contras were undertaken, and that the CIA had indeed intervened in a case involving smuggler Julio Zavala.