ChicoSol Editor Leslie Layton will speak Thursday in Phoenix at a panel discussion on covering bigotry, with journalists from publications that rank among the nation’s biggest names in investigative reporting.
Joining Layton to discuss “Investigating Hate” at the 2017 Investigative Reporters and Editors Conference will be Josh Harkinson, a senior reporter at Mother Jones; AC Thompson, a reporter for ProPublica; and Carlos Martinez de la Serna, director of innovation at Univision.read more
Desmond Phillips, a mentally ill young black man killed by Chico police on March 17, was hit by 11 bullets — not shot 10 times, as Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey has claimed — according to a forensic autopsy report reviewed by ChicoSol.
One of those 11 rounds hit Phillips in the nose and then re-entered his body through his chest, creating a total of 12 gunshot entry wounds, says the autopsy report. That same bullet, which the report says traveled in a downward direction at a “sharp angle,” tore through Phillips’ heart, causing his most grievous wound.read more
Retired police officer Mike Summers of West Sacramento addressed a crowd of about a hundred people Thursday evening at a community workshop on Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training at Chico’s First Christian Church. Summers is an advocate of the so-called Memphis Model of de-escalation, which he said resulted in a dramatic decrease in officer-involved shootings in the Tennessee city beginning in the late ‘80s.
Summers said law enforcement officers are typically trained at police academies to exhibit a “command presence,” which doesn’t always work well in dealing with the mentally ill. Thursday’s event was hosted by Crisis Care Advocacy and Triage in the wake of the killing of Desmond Phillips, a mentally ill young black man who was shot 11 times by Chico police on March 17. ChicoSol will publish a follow-up story on the Phillips shooting on June 17. -- photo and story by Dave Waddell.
Usually, the park maintenance crew has Sycamore Pool cleaned and ready for use by Memorial Day weekend, the official start of the summer swimming season — but not this year.
Heavy winter storms and a swift spring snow melt brought a greatly increased flow of water down Big Chico Creek, resulting in a pressure and volume of water too great to be accommodated by the underground tunnel the park maintenance crew relies on to divert the creek while it cleans the pool. Finally, last week when the water flow had calmed, the crew began the yearly cleaning of the pool at the One-Mile Recreation Area.read more
This is the second story in our “Tracking Hate” series. Our first story, “CSUC student newspaper sparks hate speech debate,” was posted June 8.
When a Chico State staff member posted her “You Matter” flier on a wall in the Meriam Library stairwell after the Nov. 8, 2016, presidential election, she believed it would convey an uplifting message.
Instead, it was defaced, and the defaced flier circulated on Facebook, to be shared and commented on dozens of times by alarmed staff and other members of the campus community.read more
This is the first in a two-part series. Part 2 on Chico State’s political climate will be posted June 9.
by Leslie Layton
On a recent Wednesday, Chico State journalism professor Mark Plenke was messaged that he should check the campus newspaper racks. The student-run weekly newspaper, The Orion, had come out earlier that day, and an opinion column was already producing a stream of angry social media responses.
Plenke, the faculty adviser to The Orion, found some 600 newspapers missing from racks in Tehama and Butte halls and rescued them from nearby garbage and recycling bins. The May 10 column by student journalist Roberto Fonseca, “Debunking GSEC Myths,” had already inspired a newspaper theft and was on the verge of sparking a campus debate that would veer from angry threats to culture-wars name-calling to thoughtful discussion.read more
