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Investigative journalist and photographer. Currently at Reuters and Durham University as the Sir Harry Evans Global Fellow for Investigative Journalism.

In Los Angeles, my longform feature in the Los Angeles Times explored how bureaucratic failures forced the sheriff’s department to rehire deputies who had previously been fired for their involvement in a secret society that celebrated police violence, and which one senior department official likened to a criminal gang. One deputy at the time of his rehiring faced ongoing felony charges.

In San Antonio, I chronicled how amateur investors from Austin are plundering working class apartment complexes and evading regulations, and how tenants are paying the price.

In East Tennessee, my local series on a county government’s Faustian bargain to save its health insurance program at the expense of local pharmacies won the state Associated Press’s Malcolm Law Award for Investigative Reporting. My coverage of the ongoing opioid crisis also won recognition from the Tennessee Press Association.

I studied data science and new media storytelling at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Journalism, where I was the 2020 Selden Ring Fellow for Investigative Journalism. I earned my bachelor’s degree in Philosophy from Oberlin College in 2016.

Outside of writing, I enjoy playing the banjo and bicycling.

waylonwc@gmail.com / (903) 253 – 6473