Behind The 13th Step, Part 2: The best defense is the truth

On May 6, 2024, The 13th Step team was honored with a Pulitzer Prize nomination for audio reporting "for their gripping and extensively reported investigation of corruption and sexual abuse within the lucrative recovery industry that sought accountability despite legal pressure.”

Today, we go behind the scenes, once again, with New Hampshire Public Radio Reporter Lauren Chooljian and Story Editor Alison MacAdam to learn their techniques for ensuring journalistic accuracy and fairness as they faced attempts at intimidation. And this close team learned how to create a "trauma-informed workplace" -- and how emotional support techniques helped them to keep going.  

This is Part 2 of "Behind the blockbuster investigative series The 13th Step: The best defense is the truth." 

Listen to Part 1
How to Find the Truth: Behind the Blockbuster Investigative Series The 13th Step

Takeaways from today's episode include: 

1. In today's journalistic and political environment, the best defense is the truth. That means using every reporting strategy you can to make sure all of your reporting is factual, precise, backed up with evidence and well organized.

2.  Corroborate, corroborate, corroborate. In your story or series, explain that you corroborated your facts and how you did.

3. Transparency is key. Paint thorough, fair portraits of your subjects. Human beings are complex and contradictory. This tension makes for fascinating stories and builds credibility.

4. Newsroom or network leadership needs to be as committed to your journalism as you are. Depending on the circumstances, they may need to pay legal fees, tap insurance and even fund security.

5. Chooljian had two huge reasons to continue reporting, even after she, her family, and her newsroom were targeted in a rash of criminal threats.  The first: Her sources had bravely stepped forward to share their stories with her. Doing so put them at risk — as she says, a risk they took without the kinds of organizational, financial and legal resources available to her. Second: Backing down would have sent a signal to others that retaliation works. That's unacceptable.

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For more takeaways from this episode on crafting an investigative series and why accountability journalism is so important, visit Current. 

Listen to the series deconstructed on today's show: The 13th Step. 

Starting your own podcast?  Be strategic with our Sound Judgment Show Bible Workbook. 

Want to learn more about how NHPR's Document Team greenlights projects like The 13th Step to begin with? Listen to  "How to Pitch an Audio Documentary and the Unusual Origin of a This American Life story." 

More about The 13th Step

Read about the team
Check out  the supporting legal documents

Resources on addiction treatment, substance use disorder, sexual misconduct, and more<