Dayhoff Westminster Soundtrack: Sara Michael: MEDIA MAY 8 2009 Stephen Janis The Voice of Baltimore

Friday, May 15, 2009

Sara Michael: MEDIA MAY 8 2009 Stephen Janis The Voice of Baltimore

After his newspaper shut down, investigative reporter Stephen Janis started his own news website.

Sara Michael http://www.gelfmagazine.com/archives/the_voice_of_baltimore.php

Conversations with Stephen Janis are often interrupted by his cellphone. The former investigative reporter at the Baltimore Examiner newspaper never stops taking calls and meeting sources, and not even the newspaper's folding in February slowed him down. Having covered stories in Baltimore City like the murders of prostitutes and the arrest of a seven-year-old for sitting on a dirt bike, Janis can't stop now.

Perhaps he's become completely mired in the ills of the city; perhaps he is fully unemployable in any other field. But once laid off from the newspaper, he took his leads, his sources, and his obsession with unearthing the real story, and launched his own online news organization, Investigative Voice. After just two months, the website has broken stories that were picked up by the local television media.

Janis, a former contributing writer for the city's alternative weekly and a former record producer, was part of the original crew that launched the Baltimore Examiner, a free tabloid daily, in April 2006. The Examiner's short stories (most of them around 500 words) and sensational headlines (think "Bludgeoned!" and "Suburban Shocker") competed with the legacy Baltimore Sun newspaper, itself now a struggling rag. Janis covered stories others wouldn't touch, and made officials in the city government pay attention, picking up fans and enemies along the way. His stories on a city parking agent writing fake tickets led to an inspector general investigation, and his series on the mysterious death of activist and prominent businessman Robert Lee Clay prompted the FBI to reopen the case.

Even before the Baltimore Examiner folded on Feb. 15, Janis was planning Investigative Voice, and the site went live nine days after the last paper was printed. While the other laid-off reporters, including me, dusted off our résumés, my former colleague Janis was still meeting with sources. In the following interview, which has been edited for clarity, Janis talks about how he wrestles with having to play the competing roles of a businessman concerned with driving hits to the site and an investigative reporter obsessed with keeping tabs on crime and City Hall… http://www.gelfmagazine.com/archives/the_voice_of_baltimore.php

20090508 MEDIA Stephen Janis The Voice of Baltimore

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