Joseph Shapiro
Joseph Shapiro is a NPR News Investigations correspondent.
Shapiro's major investigative stories include his reports on the way rising court fines and fees create an unequal system of justice for the poor and the rise of "modern day debtors' prisons," the failure of colleges and universities to punish for on-campus sexual assaults, the epidemic of sexual assault of people with intellectual disabilities, the problems with solitary confinement, the inadequacy of civil rights laws designed to get the elderly and people with disabilities out of nursing homes, and the little-known profits involved in the production of medical products from donated human cadavers.
His "Child Cases" series, reported with PBS Frontline and ProPublica, found two dozen cases in the U.S. and Canada where parents and caregivers were charged with killing children, but the charges were later reversed or dropped. Since that series, a Texas man who was the focus of one story was released from prison. And in California, a woman who was the subject of another story had her sentence commuted.
Shapiro joined NPR in November 2001 and spent eight years covering health, aging, disability, and children's and family issues on the Science Desk. He reported on the health issues of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan and helped start NPR's 2005 Impact of War series with reporting from Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center. He covered stories from Hurricane Katrina to the debate over overhauling the nation's health care system.
Before coming to NPR, Shapiro spent 19 years at U.S. News & World Report, as a Senior Writer on social policy and served as the magazine's Rome bureau chief, White House correspondent, and congressional reporter.
Among honors for his investigative journalism, Shapiro has received an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award, George Foster Peabody Award, George Polk Award, Robert F. Kennedy Award, Edward R. Murrow Award, Sigma Delta Chi, IRE, Dart, Ruderman, and Gracie awards, and was a finalist for the Goldsmith Award.
Shapiro is the author of the award-winning book NO PITY: People with Disabilities Forging a New Civil Rights Movement (Random House/Three Rivers Press), which is widely read in disability studies classes.
Shapiro studied long-term care and end-of-life issues as a participant in the yearlong 1997 Kaiser Media Fellowship in Health program. In 1990, he explored the changing world of people with disabilities as an Alicia Patterson Foundation fellow.
Shapiro attended the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Carleton College. He's a native of Washington, DC, and lives there now with his family.
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Take a tour through New York and you'll see how the 25-year-old Americans with Disabilities Act is benefiting everyone.
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Says one public defender: "The frightening thing about solitary is that when it erodes your ability to interact with other human beings, in turn that trauma is inflicted on your family members." -
An investigation by NPR and The Marshall Project found that many states don't keep track of how many inmates are released directly from solitary confinement without any transition or supervision. -
Lawsuits filed in Ferguson and Jennings, Mo., seek justice for impoverished people who are jailed, sometimes for weeks, for not being able to pay what they owe the cities. -
The Center for Community Alternatives says that formerly incarcerated men and women rely heavily upon family, almost always receiving cash from them.
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Massachusetts is one of a growing number of states that are putting new restrictions on the practice of restraining and secluding public school students.
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Losing your driver's license is a serious penalty, but often it's for nothing to do with unsafe driving. Without one, many who can't afford to pay the fines have a hard time finding or keeping a job.
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The city of Montgomery, Ala., was sued by a group of people who said they were jailed when they couldn't pay court fines and fees. Now the city has agreed to take steps to help those too poor to pay. -
The council in the Missouri town met Tuesday for the first time since the shooting of Michael Brown. A plan introduced would address one source of tension: heavy collection of court fines and fees. -
A controversial practice to tie, hold down or seclude agitated students mostly impacts kids with disabilities. Schools say it's for safety, but opponents say it's dangerous and a civil rights issue.
