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It’s been said variety is the spice of life, and I’ve been fortunate to have plenty of it during my now-29-year journalism career.
The police beat. The law courts beat. Writing six books. Hosting a nationally syndicated radio show for more than a decade. Penning scripts for a fictional web series. Participating in more than a dozen documentaries. And, most recently, a shift to sports, where the major focus has been on the Winnipeg Jets, but plenty of stories, features and, for a few years, columns covering everything from football, baseball, basketball and golf to amateur wrestling, swimming, cycling and volleyball, just to name a few.
You name it, I’d like to think I’m ready, willing and able to cover it.
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Because of the above experience, I’ve always cherished being able to take on a variety of professional roles and challenges. A good team player, if you will, who can be extremely versatile given a well-rounded background.
All of which is why I’ve spent the past couple weeks taking a timeout from my current beat to briefly return to my “Mike On Crime” roots.
One of the things we pride ourselves on at the Free Press is offering our readers comprehensive content you won’t find anywhere else. Stories that take you beyond news conferences and press releases. Projects that illustrate why our product is worth investing in.
In a sense, good old-fashioned journalism.
And so when editor Paul Samyn and enterprise associate editor Scott Gibbons recently pitched the idea of having me do a bit of digging on something impacting our community in a major way these days, I told them I was definitely game now that the local NHL club wouldn’t be playing one for several months,
The subject is shoplifting, with a specific focus on how what has traditionally been viewed as a “victimless crime” is anything but these days.
It is, in a nutshell, totally out of control. And that’s not me saying it, but various stakeholders I’ve had the opportunity to speak in-depth with in recent days.
The No Frills on Notre Dame Avenue where a worker was stabbed in December while intervening with an alleged shoplifter. (Mike Deal / Free Press files)
The original plan was for one deep-dive feature that would run this coming Saturday. But we called a bit of an audible owing to both the quantity and the quality of material that has come my way based on these extensive interviews.
Now it’s a two-parter, with the follow-up piece set to run in next Tuesday’s print edition.
I’d like to say going back to writing about crime was like riding a bicycle for me, but that would be a bit of a lie. Fact is, things have changed considerably from when I first broke into the business in 1995, a fresh-faced 20-year-old right out of journalism school.
Back then, one could simply wander into the Public Safety Building — no appointment or prior approval necessary — and speak to the head of any police unit, whether it was homicide, major crimes, narcotics, organized crime or traffic.
I did countless ride-alongs with police officers without so much as signing a single consent form or running anything up the proverbial food chain. I sat in the 911 call centre with dispatchers on a whim some nights, had a police scanner at my disposal, which told me in real time what was happening in the city, and built up the kind of rapport and trust and long list of sources that proved invaluable over the years.
The things I saw, experiences I had and stories I heard could fill many, many more books.
None of that would be possible nowadays. Which, quite frankly, makes me a bit sad for some of the younger scribes in my industry.
That little nostalgic diatribe aside, I hope you find my finished product on this upcoming feature to be as eye-opening as I did. I was able to connect with some old “friends” in my former field while chatting up plenty of new faces as well who shared some very candid stories and insights.
I’m really happy with how it all turned out. And very proud to work for an organization that makes this type of work a priority.
I left my life of full-time crime (writing) in 2016 and will never return, as I’m thrilled with what truly feels like a second career — now going on eight years — in the so-called “toy department.”
But it never hurts to stretch some journalistic muscles you haven’t used in a while. Feels really good, in fact.
We’ll return to our regularly scheduled sports programming, but only after another brief timeout of a different kind. I’m taking next week off — barring some blockbuster development on the Jets beat — but will be back here in your email inbox on June 13.
In the meantime, Part 1 of my shoplifting feature won’t be my only byline in Saturday’s newspaper. I’ll have one in the sports section as well, as colleague Ken Wiebe and I are putting together a look at six key questions the Jets need to answer in what should be a busy and potentially newsworthy next month or so for the hockey club, which just hired Scott Arniel as its new head coach earlier this week.
Take care and talk soon.
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