Mpr Wins Peabody Award for Archdiocese Sex Abuse Coverage

By Nick Woltman
Pioneer Press
April 20, 2015

http://www.twincities.com/localnews/ci_27950522/mpr-wins-peabody-award-archdiocese-sex-abuse-coverage

The St. Paul Cathedral in St. Paul on March 22, 2015. (Pioneer Press: John Autey)

Minnesota Public Radio News on Monday received a 2014 George Foster Peabody award for "Betrayed by Silence," its documentary about child sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

"We're humbled and grateful to receive the award," Managing Editor Chris Worthington said in a news release. "The individual stories throughout the investigation were superbly reported and important, yet difficult because of the victims' painful experiences."

The investigation, published in July, was reported by Madeleine Baran, produced by Sasha Aslanian and edited by news director Mike Edgerly. Worthington supervised the project.

The Peabody Awards, administered by Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia, recognize excellence in broadcast journalism.

The Peabody organization called MPR's investigation "sobering," adding that it "took listeners inside the child sex-abuse scandal in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, uncovering among other things how the archbishop who headed of the committee that wrote the U.S. Catholic Church's landmark abuse policy -- the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People -- not only failed to follow it but participated in cover-ups."

"Betrayed by Silence" also won the Alfred I. duPont Award earlier this year.

Nick Woltman can be reached at 651-228-5189. Follow him on Twitter at @nickwoltman.

Contact: nwoltman@pioneerpress.com