Star’s Luke Nozicka honored for reporting that helped free Kevin Strickland from prison

Luke Nozicka of The Kansas City Star was honored Wednesday with a McClatchy President’s Award in recognition of his reporting that helped free Kevin Strickland from prison 43 years after his wrongful murder conviction.

The annual awards recognize the best work of journalists across the company’s 30 local newsrooms.

“Kevin Strickland would most likely still be behind bars if it weren’t for this reporting,” McClatchy CEO Tony Hunter said in announcing Nozicka’s award.

The awards spotlighted high-impact, investigative and accountability journalism, from newsrooms in Sacramento, California, to Wichita to Miami.

In September 2020, Nozicka first brought to light questions surrounding Strickland’s conviction in a 1978 triple homicide in Kansas City. In 2021, Jackson County prosecutors said Strickland was innocent and called for his release.

And on Nov. 23, 2021, Strickland was freed from prison after serving one of the longest wrongful conviction sentences in U.S. history. Since he was sentenced to prison in June 1979, Strickland spent more than 42 years and four months behind bars — or 15,487 days.

“From the start, Luke approached Mr. Strickland’s story with curiosity and compassion,” said Greg Farmer, The Star’s managing editor. “The result was reporting that helped right this terrible wrong and, we must hope, will have a positive impact on how the system works going forward.”

The judges were editors and executives from The Texas Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today Network, NPR News and Politico.

Last year, Nozicka was given the 2021 Jim Dwyer Award for Journalism from the Innocence Network for his reporting on Strickland.