It has been an exciting past week here at Heat City. Serial Shooter suspect Dale Hausner has been on the witness stand for five days, and takes it again for his sixth and final day today. That means his eight-count murder trial is nearing its end. The trial has been the centerpiece of this blog since it launched it back on Jan. 5, and I’ve been able to continue covering it live from the courtroom because of reader support, both financial and moral.
As it stands today, readers have donated $475 to help me continue original reporting you generally won’t find anywhere else. That’s a little over $100 a week since I began taking donations. Along with your gifts, many of you have said you like stories about local media happenings, so I’ve been trying to post more of them.
Lastly, the work that you’ve supported has been getting some attention from media watchers. A crew from the local PBS affiliate, KAET-TV (Channel 8), came out to the Maricopa County courthouse last week and interviewed me for a segment titled “Future of Journalism” on their nightly news magazine , Horizon. The crew also talked to the folks at the online Capitol news startup, the Arizona Guardian, as well as a journalism professor at Arizona State University. The segment airs tonight at 7 p.m.
Don’t worry if you can’t catch the show tonight. Being the savvy people they are, the team at Horizon posts segments online after the broadcast. I’ll either embed the video on Heat City or link to it once it goes online.
I’ve said it in past posts, but it’s worth saying again: Thank you all for your continued support and help. I can’t do it without you.