"[38], Surprised by The Washington Post article, The Mercury News's executive editor Jerome Ceppos wrote to the Post defending the series. He is survived by his loving wife, Wendie, of Elgin; grandmother, Eileen Carrier of Elgin;. During and immediately after the controversy over "Dark Alliance," Webb's earlier writing was examined closely. Ceppos and Garcia have long since lost any taste for public discussion of "Dark Alliance". When he was engaged, he worked hard. reports. 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. She was a native of Minden, LA, but a resident of Crossett for 65 years. Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in, Find your bookmarks in your Independent Premium section, under my profile. [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. When they married, she was aged just 21. A January 1997 article in American Journalism Review noted that a 1994 series Webb wrote had also been the subject of a Mercury News internal review that criticized Webb's reporting. Despite some hyped phrasing, "Dark Alliance" appears to be praiseworthy investigative reporting."[47]. Nobody who heads a government agency can let such an allegation stand.". "[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. Emma Lee Webb. He began his career working for newspapers in Kentucky and Ohio, winning numerous awards, and building a strong reputation for investigative writing. An investigative journalist, Webb became interested in the covert activities of the Central Intelligence Agency. Unfortunately, the railroading of Gary Webb had begun and he was run over. Who Is Gary Webb's Wife? 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. The first article in "Dark Alliance" that discussed the failure of law enforcement agencies to prosecute Blandn and Meneses had mentioned several cases. "Do not quote me. The second volume, "The Contra Story," was issued in a classified version on April 27, 1998, and in an unclassified version on October 8, 1998. Do not quote me on anything.". 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. Last edited on 10 February 2023, at 03:36, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, CIA involvement in Contra cocaine trafficking, "To readers of our 'Dark Alliance' series", "America's 'crack' plague has roots in Nicaragua war", "War on drugs has unequal impact on black Americans", "Los Angeles Sheriff's Department Inquiry Findings", "The CIA and Crack: Evidence Is Lacking Of Alleged Plot", "Though Evidence Is Thin, Tale of C.I.A. The "Dark Alliance" series remains controversial. And it was ignored by the US media, for all of those reasons. Emma Lee Webb, age 75, of Crossett, AR passed away Monday February 27, 2023, in her home surrounded by her family. ", The significant legacy of the Webb case, "the reason this whole affair remains so significant today," Blum says, "is this: the knowledge that, if one individual dares raise such serious issues, they risk confronting a tremendous apparatus that is prepared to whack them hard, and there is very little they can expect by way of support. To show this, the series focused on three men: Ricky Ross, Oscar Danilo Blandn, and Norwin Meneses. [20] The website artwork showed the silhouette of a man smoking a crack pipe superimposed over the CIA seal. Eli Tomac on track during Media Day at Daytona International Speedway, Friday, March 3, 2023. 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. The first shot went through his face, and exited at his left cheek. Depressed, he became increasingly unpredictable in his behaviour and embarked on a series of affairs; he was divorced from Bell in 2000, though he remained close to her throughout his life and lived in a house in nearby Carmichael. After the series's publication, the Northern California branch of the national Society of Professional Journalists voted Webb "Journalist of the Year" for 1996. WEBB, Mr. Gary Lee, our beloved son, husband, father, grandfather, brother and uncle went home with his heavenly Father Monday, August 29, 2011 at University of Michigan Hospital. Garry Webb wrote the 1996 "Dark Alliance" series for the San Jose. But the tragedy had a deeper meaning. "By the end of his life he was just in a lot of pain," said Webb's ex-wife, Susan Bell. [5], After high school, Webb attended an Indianapolis community college on a scholarship until his family moved to Cincinnati. 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. The reports of the three federal investigations into the claims of "Dark Alliance" were not released until over a year after the series's publication. She said the paper wanted to make up for what it had done in the past. The feeling was that with other news outlets calling for Webb's head, the paper's credibility depended on their joining in on the attacks. When I first heard the news, I tell Bell, I was inclined to believe the conspiracy theories that still proliferate on the internet, suggesting that Webb had been assassinated - either by one of the drug dealers he'd met while writing Dark Alliance, or by the intelligence services who were supposed to police them. 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. [31] In their front-page article, reporters Roberto Suro and Walter Pincus wrote that "available information" did not support the series's claims and that "the rise of crack" was "a broad-based phenomenon" driven in numerous places by diverse players. Noting that most of the activities discussed in the report had nothing to do with the people Webb reported on, Kornbluh told Schou, "I can't say it's a vindication. This support "was not directed by anyone within the Contra movement who had an association with the CIA," and the Committee found "no evidence that the CIA or the Intelligence Community was aware of these individuals support. . 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. According to the report's "Epilogue," the report was completed in December 1997 but was not released because the DEA was still attempting to use Danilo Blandn in an investigation of international drug dealers and was concerned that the report would affect the viability of the investigation. Although he attended Northern Kentucky for four years, he did not finish his degree. Unable to get work from any major US newspaper, he spent the four months before his death writing for * a free-sheet covering the Sacramento area. By a fortunate coincidence of timing, the report was released on a day when the Monica Lewinsky scandal dominated every front page in the country. [66] He was born at Emmanuel Hospital in. [51], The editors met with Webb several times in February to discuss the results of the paper's internal review and eventually decided to print neither Carey's draft article nor the articles Webb had filed. On Dec. 9, 2004, the 49-year-old Gary Stephen Webb, Pulitzer prize-winning US investigative journalist, typed out suicide notes to his ex-wife and his three children; he laid out a certificate for his cremation; he taped a note on the door telling movers - who were coming the next morning to move him out of his rental house near Sacramento - to Ceppos failed to reply to one phone message and six emails. The review was conducted primarily by editor Jonathan Krim and reporter Pete Carey, who had written the paper's first published analysis of the series. [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. When he told me, I said it sounded crazy. 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. OR was he like Epstein? 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. It also examined "how CIA handled and responded to information regarding allegations of drug trafficking" by people involved in Contra activities or support. "I think the behaviour of the media in all of this has been amazing," says Bell. But you say - dear God. In February last year he was laid off by the State Legislature. .article-native-ad strong { "[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. The CIA Inspector-General's report was issued in two volumes. He is from United States. Webb's corpse was found in the bedroom, with two gunshot wounds to the head. "[78], While finding this part of the series unsupported, Schou said that some of the series's claims on CIA involvement are supported, writing that "The CIA conducted an internal investigation that acknowledged in March 1998 that the agency had covered up Contra drug trafficking for more than a decade." He was laid off in February 2004 when Assembly Member Fabian Nez was elected Speaker. In 1986, Webb wrote an article saying that the Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, Frank D. Celebrezze accepted contributions from groups with organized crime connections. 1) It presented only one interpretation of conflicting evidence and in one case "did not include information that contradicted a central assertion of the series." We are in the living room of Bell's house just outside Sacramento, California. Gary Webb was a journalist of outsized talent. And this is not a happy story - or," she adds, "a little one.". Gary's ex-wife Susan Bell states: "The way he was acting it would be hard for me to believe it was anything but suicide." An interesting OPINION, but she supplies no convincing evidence to illustrate what she means by this. Actor Jeremy Renner portrays Webb.[83]. 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. Then, in August the same year, the first of three instalments of "Dark Alliance" appeared. [73], On the other hand, many of the writers and editors who worked with him have had high praise for him. He really did believe that," she says. [50] By January, Webb filed drafts of four more articles based on his trip, but his editors concluded that the new articles would not help shore up the original series's claims. The series follows the stories of several characters whose lives are fated to intersect including CIA operative Teddy McDonald who helps to secure guns for the Contras. The Los Angeles Times and other major papers published articles suggesting the "Dark Alliance" claims were overstated and, in November 1996, Jerome Ceppos, the executive editor at Mercury News, wrote about being "in the eye of the storm". They were outraged by the series's charges.[27]. He is the oldest son of Pulitzer Prize-winninginvestigative journalist Gary Webb, the subject of the 2014 film "Kill the Messenger," starring Hollywood heavyweight Jeremy Renner. So, how much is Gary Webb worth at the age of 49 years old? By this stage, he was prepared to work as a jobbing reporter. When his medical insurance expired, he stopped taking his antidepressants. American racer Cooper Webb is married to his wife named Mariah Williams Webb. Peter Kornbluh, senior analyst with the George Washington University's National Security Archive, was one of the first to suggest that Webb had overplayed his hand in the Mercury News version of "Dark Alliance". And the importance of exposing them. Webb's series was published on the Mercury News's fledgling website, but it wasn't exactly an instant sensation. Webb worked for several newspapers including The Kentucky Post and Cleveland Plain Dealer. In a three-part expos, investigative journalist Gary Webb reported that a guerrilla army in Nicaragua had used crack cocaine sales in Los Angeles' black neighborhoods to fund an attempted coup of Nicaragua's socialist government in the 1980s and that the CIA had purposefully funded it. [13] Webb then moved to the paper's statehouse bureau, where he covered statewide issues and won numerous regional journalism awards. "He had six in a short period of time." "And to an extent, they succeeded.". By the time Webb began researching Dark Alliance, Bell was 38 and they had three children. Webb's reports prompted three official investigations, including one by the CIA itself which - astonishingly for an organisation rarely praised for its transparency - confirmed the substance of his findings (published at length in Webb's 1998 book, also entitled Dark Alliance). Blandn and Meneses were Nicaraguans who smuggled drugs into the U.S. and supplied dealers like Ross. In addition, Gary left multiple suicide notes to family members which were confirmed to be in his own hand by them. His corpse was discovered on the seventh anniversary of his resignation from the Mercury News. The room is decorated with his trophies: a Pulitzer prize hangs next to his HL Mencken award; also on the wall is a framed advertisement for The Kentucky Post. He said: 'No. Vivian Corrie, a part of his liver in a life-threatening operation. Webb, according to Bell, was a man who, more than most, found that his mood and self-esteem fluctuated in accordance with his professional fortunes. 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." It was good that his story forced those reports to come out, but part of what made that happen was based on misleading information. [69], Webb was found dead in his Carmichael home on December 10, 2004, with two gunshot wounds to the head. When removal men arrived, on the morning of 10 December 2004, they found a sign on his front door, which read: ''Please do not enter. Begun 1996, the divorce and battle over cash of Grammy winner Jimmy Webb age 75, father of six, wed 22 years to Patsy, 64, daughter of late actor Barry Sullivan is getting longer.
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