News

Goshen, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has discovered failed St. Joseph County Assessor Candidate, Ted Booker (D), broke the law by campaigning on the taxpayer dollar. Booker, who is employed as a Deputy Assessor for the Elkhart County Assessor's Office, appears to have been campaigning during the 2022 election cycle while on the clock. The revelations come after a public records request made by RNM showing Booker was reprimanded by his superiors for bringing campaign business into work with him.

NOTRE DAME, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has learned Discovery Middle School in the Penn Harris Madison school district is promoting a STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) event for young girls being hosted at the University of Notre Dame. While the event claims to be for all girls, the registration page for the day-long event appears to show that only white children are going to be forced to pay to attend. However, girls of color and boys who identify as girls will be offered "scholarships" to pay for the registration fee.

LAPORTE, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has been provided photos and videos showing thousands of patient files simply abandoned at the old LaPorte Hospital in Downtown LaPorte. The files contain social security numbers, birth dates, healthcare information, even pictures of surgeries and naked bodies. In response to our investigation and inquiries into the HIPAA violations, Northwest Health requested RNM destroy the evidence we obtained.

MISHAWAKA, Ind. -- The Penn Harris Madison School Corporation Superintendent and his wife have created a scholarship for a graduating Penn High School senior that excludes only one race of people. The "Student Educator Scholarship" is for a graduating senior who plans to seek a degree in teacher education. The only other criteria for applying is that the student cannot be white.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has learned the former Administrator of the county-run Portage Manor assisted living facility illegally nailed the widows shut in resident rooms and forced the people living there to follow prison-like rules, violating their rights. Robyn Challinor worked as the head administrator of the facility for nearly 5-and-a-half-years before stepping down in September of 2021. On top of the obvious fire code violations from nailing the windows shut, RNM also uncovered a list of prison-like rules drafted by Challinor that every resident was forced to obey.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has learned a man living at the Old Knights Inn on Lincolnway West, that is now home to the Motels4Now homeless initiative, died from a drug overdose only days before the organization put together a group of activists in an attempt to intimidate elected officials into giving the program $1.65 million in taxpayer money. Nobody from the organization mentioned the death as they filled a St. Joseph County Council meeting in February with dozens of protestors demanding the county continue to fund the failed initiative. It turns out, only days after the meeting, RNM has confirmed another man connected to the program died from a suspected overdose. That information was also not shared with elected officials as the program continues to put pressure on the County Council for more money.

MISHAWAKA, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana continues to discover more issues and policy violations in the cover-up scandal regarding a suspected Operating While Intoxicated incident involving Mayor Dave Wood's 21-year-old son, Joe Wood. Since we broke the story last week, RNM has learned the Mishawaka Police shift commander, Captain Eric Beckham, allegedly intimidated his subordinates, the city attorney attempted to hide public information and now we confirmed Captain Beckham also violated department policy by not activating his bodycamera when interacting with Joe Wood before ultimately covering up the suspected crime.

MISHAWAKA, Ind. -- The Mishawaka Police Department has finally released the bodycamera video captured during a suspected OWI (Operating While Intoxicated) stop involving Mayor Dave Wood's son, 21-year-old Joe Wood. In the video, the initiating officer says he can smell alcohol on the suspect. Joe Wood is also seen stumbling out of his car. At the beginning of the stop, Joe Wood almost immediately starts asking for the shift commander, Captain Eric Beckham. When Beckham shows up, Joe Wood excitedly calls out his name and walks over to him. Within seconds, Beckham tells Wood to lock up his car as it is being left on scene. He then tells responding officers that he will "take care of it." Beckham then drove Wood to his dad's house, who happens to be the Mayor of Mishawaka. While every officer on scene appears to have had their bodycamera running during the interaction, there was no video captured by Captain Beckham.

ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, Ind. -- REAL News Michiana has learned about a St. Joseph County "Youth Librarian" who has focused in on sharing sexual material with children as part of her job. St. Joseph County Youth Librarian, Erin Donaldson, has pushed for children to secretly attend "rainbow story hour" without parental permission, advocated for children to be given pornography and attacked a group of citizens for criticizing sexualized readings meant for kids.

Captain Eric Beckham, Mishawaka Police Department -- Photo: Facebook MISHAWAKA, Ind. -- An official with the State of Indiana has directed an attorney with the City of Mishawaka to release the video regarding the cover-up...