The power of social media to solve a mystery case

A nameless man brought garbage bags full of photos and priceless documents into 2News studios one morning and asked that they be given to the rightful owner. He only said he found them in a car wash trash can in downtown Salt Lake City. Then he was gone.

As the social media lead at KUTV2News, I posted some photos on our Facebook page and a story on our website asking for help from the public to identify anyone in these photos. Some photos were a dated back to the mid 1900s, while others were birthday cards from the '90s, or Catholic baptismal records. Within a few hours we found the owners. We were able to help find the owner of hundreds of lost photos and get them back to their rightful owners.

2News reporter Dan Rascon tells the rest of the story about how they got lost in the first place in his "Inside The Story."

Disney's 'Up' movie house in Herriman Utah celebrates Christmas

I took a peek inside the 'Up' house during Christmas time to see what the new owners of the home have done with the place. You won't believe it. The California natives brought Santa Claus to the porch for donations toward The Sub-For-Santa Charity.

See the video below:
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/55493137-78/hamblin-param-value-disney.html.csp

Utah Highway Patrol investigative story

Investigating the Blindspot of Discipline at

 the Utah Highway Patrol

In this multi-media story I interviewed a former UHP trooper and he explains some issues with how discipline is inconsistent.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE.
or copy and paste this link http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/55290911-78/uhp-complaints-wilder-trooper.html.csp

 See video below.

"To this day, to know how Gary was treated versus how I was treated is frustrating"

The issues go far beyond Trooper Lisa Steed.
I worked with The Salt Lake Tribune colleague Nate Carlisle to investigate and expose the inconsistencies in discipline at UHP.
We went on KUTV Ch. 2 (CBS affiliate) to promote our story.

Click link here to see : Promoting story on KUTV Ch. 2.

Here is the link to our in-depth investigative story. It discusses how one trooper will be treated different and even lose their job while others in similar cases will only be given a verbal warning.

Citizens work to repeal HB477

THE DAY MY 20-YEAR-OLD GRAMA DIED

March 4, 2011 went down as a day of infamy in Utah at the Capitol with the passing of HB 477. It became known as the day our GRAMA died. It became the day public records and transparency in a state with one of the best public records laws in the United States is now slated (pending the signature of Governor Herbert) to become one of the worst in the nation and even rival limited freedom of information laws in Mexico.
These are the folks that passed it. Keep them in mind next time you vote. Are they truly representing you and open transparency in government?
In the House:
In the Senate:
So who accesses these records and why is this such a big deal?
First, listen to regular citizens who commented during a rules committee hearing on Friday about it.
I did a live video stream of the proceedings from my phone.
According to a story in the Salt Lake Tribune, the majority of Freedom of Information requests made nationally were done by commercial businesses and private citizens. The news media comes in at only 6 percent, according to a 2006 report from the Coalition of Journalists for Open Government.
Who does this bill effect? The people. However it doesn't reflect the what the people want. A Dan Jones poll indicated more than 90 percent of Utahns disagreed with the passing of the bill. So why was it passed?
"It is a bill created by the legislature, for the legislature, and against the people," to quote my mother who said it so aptly.

HB477 bill sponsor Rep. John Dougall (photo above courtesy of ABC4.com) 

See the interviews of reporters asking him why the rush in the bill. Does he have something to hide?
FOX13 interview
ABC4 interview
Legislators along with Dougall gutted a law made in 1992, to allow the public rights and access to public records. Basically anything created by the government is a public record, unless deemed to be private.
An amendment to the Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA)
Legislators voted in the House and the Senate to conceal many public records including text messages, IM, voicemails, and some e-mails. They also made the legislative branch of government exempt from disclosing any of the written conversations they have with their constituents. This is a tough blow to Utah open records laws in the state. However, they didn't stop there. On top of making these new restrictions, they added "overhead and administrative" fees that could be added to any government record request. Essentially removing any type of financial cap on how much an agency could charge to have someone obtain a public record.
So for example, if you wanted to request a regular government record like a birth, divorce, death certificate, land use or water rights history those fees could now go from nothing to an inflated cost just to get a copy.
When I was a student reporter working at The Signpost at Weber State University, I did an investigation on felons working in higher education. Under HB477 this sort of story would have no chance of being accomplished at a collegiate level, because of new charges in fees.
Here is a well thought out editorial by the managing editor of the Valley Journals and also with the Utah Foundation for Open Government. click here:

Broadcast TV News Resumé

Interview and Promotional Video

Snow College Recruitment Video
I created this video for recruitment to be used by Snow College. I shot, edited and produced this video.

Snow College Recruitment Video from Cimaron Neugebauer on Vimeo.

This shows some of my editing and interview work in a fully produced video