Produced by The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and Final Cut for Real, the documentary “The Killing of a Journalist” is about the 2018 murders of Slovak investigative journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancee, Martina Kušnírová. Underlining the threats journalists face simply for doing their jobs, the killings were a shocking act of violence that directly threatened the EU’s founding principles of freedom of expression and the rule of law.

The film shows how the killings spurred mass protests and investigations in Slovakia that eventually brought down judges, police, and even a government.

Ján was a tenacious reporter and covered one of the most dangerous beats in journalism: the nexus between organized crime and politics. At the time of his death, he was working on a cross border investigation with journalist Pavla Holcová, who helped complete and publish Jan’s stories, including one that connected Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico’s inner circle to the most powerful Italian mafia, the N’drangheta. The string of revelations would eventually lead to Fico’s resignation.

The film also shows how Pavla received the leaked police files of the Kuciak/Kusnirova murder investigation, containing 70 terabytes of data and evidence that implicated Slovakian oligarch Marián Kočner. That evidence also provided an inside look into the rot at the heart of the country’s judicial system, showing how Kočner secured influence via threats, bribery, and the blackmailing of public officials, sometimes by recording audio and video of meetings with them.

The screening will be followed by a discussion and Q&A with the film's executive producers, Drew Sullivan and Paul Radu, and award winning journalist and current Stanford JSK Fellow Pavla Holcová.

PANELIST BIOS

Drew Sullivan
Executive Producer, “The Killing of a Journalist”
Co-Founder and Publisher, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP)

Drew Sullivan is a social entrepreneur and co-founder and publisher of OCCRP. He founded the organization in 2007 with Paul Radu and served as editor-in-chief until March 2023. Under his direction, OCCRP has won numerous awards, including the Daniel Pearl Award, the Global Shining Light Award, the Tom Renner Award for Crime Reporting, the European Press Prize, and the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship. Drew also created Reporters Shield, a membership program for media outlets and NGOs that helps defend investigative journalism against SLAPPs and other legal harassment.

Paul Radu
Executive Producer, “The Killing of a Journalist”
Co-Founder and Chief of Innovation, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP)

Paul Radu is Head of Innovation at OCCRP. He co-founded the organization in 2007 with Drew Sullivan and leads OCCRP’s major investigative projects, scopes regional expansion, and develops new strategies and technology to expose organized crime and corruption across borders.

Paul initiated and led the award-winning Russian, Azerbaijani, and Troika Laundromat investigations, and coined the term “laundromat” to define large scale, all-purpose financial fraud vehicles that are used to launder billions of dollars. He is a co-creator of Investigative Dashboard — a research desk that sifts through datasets to help journalists trace people, companies, and assets.

Paul is an Ashoka Global Fellow and has held a number of other fellowships, including the Knight International Journalism Fellowship with the International Center for Journalists as well as a 2009-2010 Stanford Knight Journalism Fellowship.

Pavla Holcová
Editor in chief, investigace.cz
Central Europe Editor, OCCRP

Pavla Holcová is an investigative journalist and founder of independent outlet investigace.cz in the Czech Republic. Pavla Holcová joined OCCRP in 2013 and is a regional editor for Central Europe. She has contributed to major cross-border projects such as the Panama Papers, the Russian and Azerbaijani Laundromats, the Pegasus Project, the Pandora Papers, and the Russian Asset Tracker. Holcová is a current JSK Fellow at Stanford and the winner of the ICFJ Knight International Journalism Award, the World Justice Project’s Anthony Lewis Prize Award, and the Allard Prize for International Integrity.

Cold War Radio is a fascinating look at how the United States waged the Cold War through the international broadcasting of Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). Mark G. Pomar served in senior positions at VOA and RFE/RL from 1982 to 1993, during which time the Reagan and Bush administrations made VOA and RFE/RL an important part of their foreign policy. Pomar takes readers inside the two radio stations to show how the broadcasts were conceived and developed and the impact they had on international broadcasting, U.S.-Soviet relations, Russian political and cultural history, and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Pomar provides nuanced analysis of the broadcasts and sheds light on the multifaceted role the radios played during the Cold War, ranging from instruments of U.S. Cold War policy to repositories of independent Russian culture, literature, philosophy, religion, and the arts. Cold War Radio breaks new ground as Pomar integrates his analysis of Cold War radio programming with the long-term aims of U.S. foreign policy, illuminating the role of radio in the peaceful end of the Cold War.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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This event is co-sponsored by CREEES Center for Russian, East European & Eurasian Studies and the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law.

The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies are pleased to co-sponsor a screening of Vera Krichevskaya's film, "Tango with Putin: Fighting for Free Media in Russia," a documentary that traces the growth and eventual shuttering of Dozhd TV (TV Rain), the last independent TV station in Russia. Using founder Natalia Sindeeva's experiences, the film explores the realities faced by journalists trying to push back against the Kremlin's highly controlled media landscape.

Following the screening, FSI Director and former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul will lead a discussion and audience Q&A with the filmmakers.

Please register for the event in advance. The screening is open to all, and seating is on a first-come basis.

About the Film
 

In 2008, 35-year-old Natasha was a newly rich, successful woman looking for fame, reputation, and for dreams to come true. She decided to launch an independent TV station in Putin’s Russia. Unlike the state-sponsored outlets, Natasha hired opposition reporters and minorities, activists and LGBTQ community members. Soon, her project became the lone island of political and sexual freedom. For 12 years, Dozhd TV (also known as TV Rain) remained the only independent news TV station in Russia. 

What Natasha couldn't have known was that she and her station would end up on the frontlines of the war between truth and propaganda, face financial ruin, and eventually lose the motherland she had worked so hard to reform. On March 3, 2022 TV Rain was shut down by the Russian state on the sixth day of the war in Ukraine. But it is not the end of the story.
 

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