Kansas City Star Reporters Win Top Honor in Detroit Press Club Foundation's Wheel Awards Automotive Journalism Competition

DEARBORN, Mich., May 15 /PRNewswire/ -- The Detroit Press Club Foundation (DPCF) presented its 2008 International Wheel Awards for excellence in automotive journalism at the Automotive Hall of Fame this evening.

The top honor, the Golden Wheel Award, went to reporters Mike Casey and Rick Montgomery of The Kansas City Star for their story "Fatal Failures."

According to the judges at the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University, led by Senior Assistant Dean Richard Roth, the story "is an excellent example of what it means to discover the news. One nugget buried in a database caused these reporters to analyze 1.9 million records compiled by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and discover that no fewer than 1,400 people were killed from 2001 to 2006 because the front-seat passenger air bags did not deploy during front-end crashes. This exhaustive reporting exercise, and the clear, compelling writing that told the story, cannot bring back the 1,400 lives lost, but it surely will have saved many lives in the future. It's the best of what journalism can be."

First-place winners in various categories included Mark Phelan, Detroit Free Press; Scott Burgess, The Detroit News; Bill Koenig, Doron Levin and Jochen Eckel, Bloomberg News; Mary Beth Vander Schaaf, Mark Rechtin and Edward Lapham, Automotive News; Tony Swan, Car and Driver; Eric Mayne, WardsAuto.com; Joseph B. White, The Wall Street Journal Online; Glenn McClanan, Edmund's Inside Line; Yolanda Vazquez, Motorweek/Maryland Public Television; Karin Annus, Randy Martin, Mike Schneider, Antony Michels, Joe Valenti and Mary Linnane, Bloomberg Television; and Jeff Gilbert, WWJ Newsradio 950.

For a complete list of honorees and judges' comments, visit the Wheel Awards Web site at www.wheelawards.com.

The International Wheel Awards are managed by the Individual Communicators Network.

DETROIT PRESS CLUB FOUNDATION is a 42-year-old, not-for-profit organization, whose charter is to promote excellence in journalism.

AUTOMOTIVE HALL OF FAME (www.automotivehalloffame.org) is the only industry-wide means to honor the women and men of the global motor vehicle and related industries.

INDIVIDUAL COMMUNICATORS NETWORK (ICN) (www.icnpr.net) is a broadly based, not-for-profit collaboration of individual communications professionals.

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Source: The Detroit Press Club Foundation

CONTACT: Steve Purdy, +1-517-655-3591, for The Detroit Press Club
Foundation

Web site: http://www.wheelawards.com/
http://www.automotivehalloffame.org/
http://www.icnpr.net/

2008-05-15 20:36:37 0363598 PRNEWSWIRE