Friday, September 17, 2010

Presenter Profile: Thomas Caywood

PechaKucha Topic:
"Investigative Journalism: How to make powerful enemies and get lots of hate mail"


Bio:

Thomas Caywood is a newspaper reporter. He cringes when people call him “The Media.” The Media get paid way more than him, wear suits, read from Teleprompters and often berate other members of The Media on cable television. As an investigative reporter for the Telegram and Gazette, Caywood has taken on projects ranging from exposing local impostors and conmen to probing troubling ties between mobsters and the region’s wealthiest man to penetrating the Byzantine tangle of mortgage-backed securities obscuring who is responsible for foreclosed properties blighting the city.



His story about how a prisoner with ties to a wealthy bank president, who in turn has ties to the county sheriff, got seemingly special treatment in jail won first place in the 2010 New England Associated Press awards in the investigative reporting category. Caywood also won first place in the “Right to Know” category this year for his work prying loose police internal affairs files on an officer accused of numerous cases of brutality and other misconduct.



An avid fan of Worcester music and arts, Caywood has been a journalist for 14 years and previously worked as a general assignment reporter for the Boston Herald and MetroWest Daily News of Framingham as well as other newspapers in Massachusetts and Louisiana. He grew up in the Washington, D.C., and San Diego areas and is a veteran of the U.S. Army. He served in the 1991 Gulf War with the 197th Infantry Brigade of Fort Benning, Ga. A graduate of Auburn University, Caywood now lives in downtown Worcester, where he stubbornly refuses to give up on becoming a decent guitar player.

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