P.O. Box 548, 132 Fairfield St. West, Twin Falls, ID 83303-0548 (208) 733-0931
Jan. 21, 2016 Dear Judges: Please consider Alex Riggins for the Idaho Press Club’s Rookie of the Year Award. Riggins hit the ground running when he started as the Times-News criminal justice reporter and immediately dove into his beat, building a pool of sources across the community. He covers crime, courts and breaking news in our eight-county coverage area, and in just a few months has proven he’s more than up for the job. Riggins has an eye for trends and connecting the dots in complex stories for readers. He turns police blotter items into compelling narratives and has a knack for getting sources – both police and civilian – to open up to him. In his short time at the Times-News he’s had numerous front page centerpieces that moved important stories forward and at the end of 2015 began work on a months-long project that will piece together a series of pharmacy robberies that shoot the community last year. Our entries for Riggins show his versatility as a writer and reporter. In one, he examined how police and schools reacted to a video showing a school resource officer violently throwing a girl out of her desk. In another, he worked backward from a meeting notice to find a group of concerned citizens who planned to present to a traffic safety committee about a dangerous rural intersection. Finally, he met with the families of relatives of the perpetrator and victims in a double-murder suicide a year after the tragedy. I’m pleased that Riggins joined our newsroom this year and I believe he is deserving of the Rookie of the Year Award. Thank you for your consideration,
Alison Smith Times-News Managing Editor