John Carlos Frey

John Carlos Frey

John Carlos Frey is an investigative reporter and documentary filmmaker based in Los Angeles. A three-time Emmy Award winner, he recently joined The Marshall Project as an investigative reporter and is a special correspondent for PBS NewsHour. Much of his reporting has been supported by the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute. His investigative work has been featured on the 60 Minutes episode, "The All American Canal;" a three-part series for PBS entitled "Crossing the Line;" and several episodes of Dan Rather Reports, "Angel of the Desert," and "Operation Streamline." In 2011 Frey documented the journey of Mexican migrants across the US-Mexico border and walked for days in the Arizona desert risking his own life for the documentary Life and Death on the Border".  John Carlos Frey has also written articles for the Los Angeles Times, the Huffington Post, Salon, Need to Know online, the Washington Monthly, and El Diario (in Spanish). Frey's documentary films include The Invisible Mexicans of Deer Canyon (2007), The Invisible Chapel (2008), and The 800 Mile Wall (2009). He is the 2012 recipient of the Scripps Howard Award and the Sigma Delta Chi award for his Investigative Fund/PBS reporting on the excessive use of force by the US Border Patrol. Last updated July 2017

Backstory

The Backstory: John Carlos Frey

John Carlos Frey talks about what motivates him as a journalist, and how he came to investigate the actions of the US Border Patrol. Frey discusses his unique perspective on the border, having been immersed in both American and Mexican culture, and he also explains how he gets his pieces noticed by mainstream media, think-tanks, and policy makers in Washington, DC.