BOSS HOG
and
THE NEWS & OBSERVER's
RESEARCH TEAM

By Brooke Cain, researcher with The N&O Research Department

[Editor's note: This series earned The News & Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina the 1996 Pulitizer Prize for Meritorious Public Service. Investigative reporters Pat Stith and Joby Warrick with special projects editor Melanie Sill lead the effort. The paper's news research department headed by Teresa Leonard played a significant role. Here is the story written by one of the key news researchers for the series, Brooke Cain.]

Research at The News & Observer is a collaborative effort between researchers, reporters and editors. Information is shared and ideas and leads spring from conversations and compared notes. The series incorporated this philosophy of teamwork unline any story we'd worked on in the past.

The story itself began as check of phone records of a state official who was suspected of accompanying major players in the hog industry on hunting trips, and evolved into an examination of the hog industry and how it operates in North Carolina.

Here are some of the tools we used in gathering our 16-foot stack of documents on the hog industry.

CROSS-COUNTRY TRACKING

We acquired a database listing phone numbers made by state employees on their long-distance calling cards and the number of the phone from which the call was made. Records of the official in question were culled out and we began the task of identifying hundreds of numbers on dozens of pages of calls. This enabled us to track our man and his travels across the country and know exactly where he was on almost any given date. Phone records were obtained through North Carolina General Statute 132, which declares all state records "public records."

Some of the phone numbers were found on a CD-ROM product called Phonedisc, but most of the numbers where tracked "the old fashioned way" -- we spent hours and hours calling numbers, listening for names of hotels or businesses. The residential numbers were hardest to identify, but we could always at least find the city or town from which the call originated.

GENERAL BACKGROUND

Once the story and series began taking shape, the research became a little more predictable. The reporters asked for stories on the hog industry in other states, stories on some of the major players in the industry, and information on laws pertaining to the hog industry and related environmental concerns. For these searches we mostly used Lexis/Nexis, but occasionally Dow Jones and Dialog. We also used our own in-house archive extensively.

STATISTICAL BREAKDOWNS

Another valuable resource was LINC, an information service that provides numbers and statistics on a large variety of topics pertaining to North Carolina. With LINC we were able to find: the number of hog farms in North Carolina, the number of hogs or pigs on these farms, current hog sales, property values, farm values, farm earnings, value of machines on farms, employment information, and populations and income levels of areas in North Carolina directly affected by the hog industry.

Much of this information was available in a "county profile" that LINC offers, but some was gathered using separate variables. We used some of this information from LINC to compute the percent increases in pig and people populations in North Carolina through the years. (Note: Most states offer a service similar to LINC.)

FOLLOWING THE MONEY TRAIL

A major aspect of the story involved tracking campaign contributions of individuals in the hog industry, as well as their family members and colleagues. Most of efforts centered on pig powerhouse Wendell Murphy of Murphy Family Farms in Rose Hill, N.C.

As the story points out, campaign finance reports showed that Murphy, members of his family, and his executives have contributed almost $155,000 to a variety of candidates since 1990. For example, to Governor Jim Hunt alone, the Murphy family contributed $16,000 in December 1991 $4,000 each from Murphy's mother, son, sister-in-law, and daughter. And in 1992, the Murphy's sent Hunt another $20,000 -- $2,000 each from Murphy, his mother, wife, brother, sister-in-law, sister, daughter, son, daughter-in-law, and stepson.

Most of the campaign finance research was done on our in-house "Money Machine," a Foxpro database that lists over 250,000 campaign contributions of individuals to candidates in North Carolina. Through the FEC, we obtained some additional information on contributions made to candidates in and out of North Carolina. Back to the phones...

More phone records also showed that during a two-year period Murphy's company and his family members received an average of 50 calls a week from state government offices. Along with the campaign finance records, this research helped to reveal the hog industry in North Carolina as being so influential that it served as a "satellite" of the state government.

EXACTLY WHO OWNS WHAT? Go Online . . .

When the major players became apparent, we did financial tracking on companies and individuals. I used D&B databases on Dialog to get financial reports and historical information (file 519) on Murphy Family Farms, Carroll Farms, Prestage Farms, Smithfield Foods, Tyson Foods, Lundy Packing Company, and others. I also used D&B's DMI (Dun's Market Identifier) to get short and quick (and cheap) profiles of companies (file 516 on Dialog). A DMI will get you company name, address, phone number, type of company, headquarters, sales, number of employees, officers, and more.

I also checked institutional holdings, major stockholders and ownership by insiders through Disclosure/Spectrum Ownership (dialog file 540), and got reports on insiders through Insider Trading Monitor (dialog file 549). The Corporate Affiliations database (dialog 513) gives a list of company executives and sometimes a corporate family hierarchy. The information we obtained through Dialog's Insider Trading Monitor told us that Wendell Murphy was on the board of Smithfield Foods, and that he had "indirect holdings" in the company.

We contacted the company that provides information to Insider Trading Monitor, CDA Investnet, and discovered that Murphy's indirect holdings were obtained through the name of his company. These types of checks revealed connections between all of the companies I mentioned earlier -- owners and stockholders of one company were often stockholders or on the boards of the other companies.

LOOSE ENDS and FURTHER FOLLOW UP

Finally, we used FAA databases to check aircrafts registered to Murphy and Prestage, as well as making public records requests to get similar information on boats. Public records requests were also made to obtain flight plans for Murphy's plane, and state and federal telephone records.

We contacted the Livestock Conservation Institution to get information on a swine disease called "pseudorabies."

We used the NC Secretary of State database to get information on NC companies -- registered agents and company location and type -- and incorporation papers.

We obtained information on pork, chicken, and beef consumption from the USDA.