AMSTERDAM, March 1, 2023 - OCCRP is pleased to announce the promotion of award-winning investigative journalist Miranda Patrucic to editor in chief. She will oversee editorial operations including 50+ editors across six continents and the production of OCCRP’s investigations and content.
Drew Sullivan steps down as OCCRP’s first editor in chief but will continue his role as publisher and leading OCCRP’s organizational direction and expansion along with Chief of Innovation Paul Radu.
“Miranda has been foundational to OCCRP’s growth and success, doing groundbreaking investigative work and pushing us into new regions,” said Sullivan. “In her new role, she will continuously develop the organization to confront the volatile challenges of fighting organized crime, grand corruption, disinformation, and threats to democracy.”
Editor in Chief Miranda Patrucic. (Photo: Nađa Berberović-Dizdarević)Patrucic was one of the first employees at OCCRP, a pioneer of cross-border, collaborative investigative journalism. She began in 2006 in Sarajevo as the organization’s first fact-checker before moving on to become a researcher, reporter, trainer, and editor. She oversaw work in the Balkans and became known for her reporting about the authoritarian regime in Azerbaijan after her friend and investigative reporter Khadija Ismayilova was sentenced to jail there in 2015.
In 2018, she turned her focus to Central Asia, creating an innovative program using in-depth reporting fellowships to partner with local journalists. In a region with little tradition of investigative journalism, she has helped publish stories from the closed countries of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, as well as from Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan.
“I’m thrilled to be elevated into this important role and to work more with the talented journalists and editors in OCCRP’s global network — a community that I’ve watched grow into a powerful force for the public good,” said Patrucic. “Becoming editor in chief underscores OCCRP’s mission of upskilling investigative journalists around the world. Drew has mentored me from day one and I am the embodiment of what OCCRP wants to achieve everywhere.”
OCCRP’s work in Central Asia and the Caucasus will now be overseen by two local editors whom Patrucic helped mentor.
Patrucic has worked on many investigations that have seen worldwide impact. She oversaw the award-winning Plunder and Patronage in the Heart of Central Asia and The Matraimov Kingdom series of stories, which led to protests that eventually brought down a government in Kyrgyzstan.
She is a member of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and worked on the Panama Papers, the Paradise Papers, the FinCEN Files, and the Pandora Papers. She was also a key part of several global collaborations led by OCCRP, including the Russian Asset Tracker, Suisse Secrets, and the Azerbaijani and Russian Laundromats.
“Miranda is a visionary who early on masterfully combined deep research, data journalism, investigative technology, and collaborative skills,” said Radu. “She is an inspiration to a new generation of investigative journalists.”
Patrucic will focus on a range of priorities for the newsroom, including ramping up investigations on environmental crime and tracking the dark money flows and foreign influence that threaten democracy, while implementing exciting new journalism formats that will allow OCCRP’s work to reach more people. A native of Bosnia and Herzegovina, she will work out of OCCRP’s Sarajevo hub and offices around the world.
Contact: Communications Officer Lauren Jackman, lauren@occrp.org.