This is probably the biggest story I've handled - the extremely sad assisted suicide case of Dr Ann Turner, who ultimately went abroad for help to die with her very caring and supportive family, whom I got to know well and admired for their courage and integrity. The arrangements I put in place for them and the media were sufficient to make this one of the year's biggest stories and it dominated broadcast and print from the moment it broke.  This is a tiny smattering of the coverage, which included many front pages, and a negotiated exclusive with the Sunday Times that weekend. There were ongoing news stories from this despite Dr Turner's death.

This story I researched and offered to the FT on a freelance basis. It was front and inside lead story that weekend, March/April 2007.

This story was looking like it was going to be headed, "no euthanasia in UK". See, for example, this story on the BBC news website. My job was to turn that around. That I accomplished by finding a new story angle and selling this in very quickly... as the headlines below testofy to. It made most newspapers front or leading pages. The ones below are from the Metro, the Guardian and the Daily Mail.

 

 

This front page Daily Telegraph story arose from a briefing we at the NLC (National Lottery Commission) held about the rules the NLC wished to see changed for the lottery licence. Its a fairly minimal story but with the right angle its interesting - it wasn't what Camelot, the Lottery operators who we regulated, wanted but they certainly didn't lose out and as it turned out, the rules were not changed in the way the Commission wished, anyway! A lot of stories one reads are anticipatory and do not come to pass but this will not always be obvious to the reader! Another coda for public sector bodies: often what a public body with a small profile does will be translated into what the Government is doing or planning to make it sound like a bigger story.