Emily Babay

I covered several days of suitability hearings for the applicants bidding for Philadelphia’s second casino license, live-tweeting the proceedings and filing multiple stories. Below are links to the stories I wrote and my tweets from the hearings (tweets for each presentation are in chronological order).

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The Washington Examiner

By Emily Babay

A maid or nanny alleges that her employer has raped her, taken her passport, made her shovel snow in shorts, refused to pay her or beat her unconscious.

In most cases, this is what would happen next: Police would investigate. If the allegations were true, the employer would face criminal charges and a potential civil lawsuit for emotional and monetary damages.

Unless the employer is a diplomat.

All of those allegations have been made against high-level foreign officials in Washington in recent years. They foreshadowed the sexual assault accusations from a New York hotel maid facing Dominique Strauss-Kahn, now the former chief of the International Monetary Fund. But unlike Strauss-Kahn, D.C.-area diplomats have largely escaped criminal courtrooms and serious consequences.

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As a reporter for the Washington Examiner, I use my Twitter account to post breaking news and to give readers live updates from events I’m covering.

During jury selection in the Chandra Levy trial, I posted live updates from the media room as the attorneys in the case questioned prospective jurors. I let readers know about a woman’s views on gangs, a juror who works in intelligence, a man who tweeted about the case and general selection status updates as they arose.

I’ve also posted updates from the scene while covering breaking news, such as during the September 2010 hostage situation at the Discovery Communications building in Silver Spring.