David Burnhaman ex New York Times investigative reporter whose work uncovering corruption in the New York Police Department around the 1970s inspired the two-time Oscar-nominated film. SerpicoHe died earlier this week at age 91.
According to the TimesHe died after a choking incident during dinner at his home in Spruce Head, Maine, which caused his heart to stop.
Detective Frank Serpico, an undercover officer who had been trying to get the police department to crack down on bribery, worked as Burnham’s main source, becoming the final subject of Al Pacino’s 1973 crime thriller. he interpreted.
FRANK SERPICO, Frank Serpico, 2017. ©Sundance Selects/courtesy Everett Collection
In memory of reporter Serpico wrote on social media“Couldn’t have done it without you, David,” along with a thumbs up and a prayer emoji.
Burnham was hired by the Times in 1967, after telling the late Metropolitan Editor Arthur Gelb that the news organization’s coverage of law enforcement “wasn’t very intelligent.” A year after he was hired, he got a major scoop on how officers on night shifts routinely slept in their patrol cars. While an assistant editor initially dismissed the story, Burnham took the time to piece the piece together in her own time and eventually achieved front-page publication.
Burnham’s masterpiece, however, was her three-part exposé series that launched on April 25, 1970, which resulted in public hearings and the ruined reputations of senior officials, including then-Mayor John Lindsay. Investigative reports described how agents extorted millions of dollars annually from businesses, drug dealers and gamblers amid citywide stings.
His work also launched the Knapp commission, the investigative commission that Lindsay was pressured to form and led by attorney Whitman Knapp. Serpico was a star witness, leading to the indictment of dozens of police officers and some convictions.
While Serpico was an adaptation of the non-fiction book by Peter Maas, the detective had initially asked Burnham to collaborate on a book with him. Burnham refused.
Later in his career, Burnham moved to the newspaper’s Washington bureau, where his job was to investigate safety risks at nuclear power plants, leading him to become the go-to journalist for industry whistleblowers.
Another major Burnham story concerns Karen Silkwood, a worker at an Oklahoma nuclear facility, whose suspicious death after being contaminated by plutonium became the subject of the 1983 Meryl Streep film. Silk wood. Co-written by Nora Ephron, the drama racked up five Academy Award nominations and also starred Kurt Russell and Cher. At the time, Burnham told Ephron that she was not allowed to use her name in the film.
Explaining his reasoning in a 1984 essay for the Timeswrote, “being a character in a historical event that has been reinterpreted by Hollywood for its own dramatic purposes is an irritating and frustrating experience.”
Two years later, Burnham resigned from the Times Conduct book-length research on government institutions, such as those of the 1990s. A Law Unto Itself: Power, Politics, and the IRS y 1996 Above the Law: Secret Deals, Political Fixes, and Other Misadventures of the US Department of Justice..
Near the turn of the century, Burnham helped found the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse project at Syracuse University, a database still used by journalists as an open records collection source.
He is survived by his wife Joanne Omang, a former foreign correspondent for Washington Postas well as his two daughters from his first marriage, Sarah Tayloe Burnham and Molly Bright Burnham, and four grandchildren.
