By Peyton Duncan & Kathy Dubois
This story is a part of the Cincinnati’s Storytelling of Journalism project, which represents a collaboration between Northern Kentucky University (NKU) journalism students, the NKU Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and the Greater Cincinnati Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Students interviewed seven professional journalist winners and finalists from the Greater Cincinnati SPJ Chapter’s 2021 Excellence in Journalism Awards to create these Nieman Storyboard Annotations-inspired Q&As and story annotations that analyze and celebrate our region’s award-winning works of journalism.
2021 Excellence in Journalism Award: Best of Show
Winning Journalist: Keith BieryGolick, The Cincinnati Enquirer
Winning Story: Surviving a school shooting: ‘The shooting wasn’t the worst thing to happen to me’
Keith BieryGolick didn’t initially seek out the highly personal story of Cameron Smith’s struggle to recover from a shooting at his junior high cafeteria in Madison, Ohio, The story came to him.
In the aftermath of the February 2016 tragedy at Madison Jr/Sr High School, BieryGolick’s reporting focused on the actions of the shooter. He pored through court documents to produce a story about the life and perspective of the then 14-year-old accused of pulling a gun out of his lunch box and firing at Cameron and his classmates.
When Smith’s grandfather read the story, he became frustrated with the media focus on the crime. He reached out to BieryGolick with a request. “He said, ‘You should write a story about a victim in this because Cameron didn’t have an easy life,’” BieryGolick said.
BieryGolick agreed. Over the next 1.5 years, The Cincinnati Enquirer reporter spent countless hours learning Cameron’s side of the story.
He went to Cameron’s house, his physical therapy, and anywhere he was invited to go. He observed and took notes of these places. Many times, he ended up at a gas station parking lot near Cameron’s home. He would spend 30 minutes or more just writing down everything that he remembered. “I would go to that gas station…I would park and then I would scribble,” BieryGolick said, “I would write notes for like half an hour.”
Finally, in February, 2020, he published the article “Surviving a school shooting: The shooting wasn’t the worst thing to happen to me.” This story earned BieryGolick Best of Show in the Greater Cincinnati SPJ Chapter’s 2021 Excellence in Journalism Awards.
Keith BieryGolick
BieryGolick used the many notes he took to carefully create the article that spoke about the survivors’ lives after the shooting. He decided to focus on details and used photos he took as references along with a few major quotes.
Looking back, BieryGolick believes that it was a difficult piece to write. It wasn’t because of the emotional aspect of the story, but because of the bonds he made with the family during that year.
NKU students Peyton Duncan, Kathy Dubois and Andrew Dixon interviewed BieryGolick about his interviewing process, use of details and methods of revision.
Out of all the stories you have written, where does this one in particular rank for you?
Definitely pretty high, it’s not my favorite. I have a clear favorite that I have done. My favorite story was about a veteran who killed himself, and was about the dad’s struggles with it and their relationship, and sort of figuring out what to do after it happened and his son was gone. I would say this one is in the top 10, and I am very proud of it, and I just like the fact that it isn’t all about the shooting, it’s about all this other stuff going on in Cameron’s life, not just the school shooting.
With how much Cameron disliked his mother, how hard was it to get them in the same room and get quotes from them?
It wasn’t difficult. It was about putting in the work to be there. We didn’t set it up for us to be there when his mom got home from the rehab facility, it kind of just happened. I just happened to be there the first time that she returned home. That is something that you would ask to be there for, and it just happened. At some point, she was living there, so it wasn’t hard to get them in the same room and get the quotes, because I didn’t want to insert myself into their situation more than I already was. I didn’t ask many questions to the mom, or Cameron about his mom, I kind of just hung out. When she first got home, he was not excited, and that told me a lot.
Have you talked or heard from Cameron since this story was published in early 2020?
Yes, it is actually sad because his grandmother passed away shortly after it was published. So, he lives with his grandfather now in Indiana, and I mean not recently, but we texted back and forth a few times a couple months ago. I have a young kid now and he was not around when I was doing this story and interviewing Cameron, so I sent him a few pictures of my son, and asking how he was doing. They did like the story, his grandmother reached out to me right after it was published, so a little bit of contact there.
As a journalist, what is one thing you learned from this story?
It definitely reinforced my belief that everybody has a story. Also, when bad things like this [the school shooting] happen, there’s always a ton of media interest right then and there, but I’ve learned that it definitely pays to go back and try to figure out what really happened. After everybody moves on from a story, that’s when people want to share what really happened, so I try to help them do that.
Surviving a school shooting: ‘The shooting wasn’t the worst thing to happen to me’
By Keith BieryGolick, The Cincinnati Enquirer
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| Meg Vogel / The Enquirer |
MADISON, Ohio – He had to fight for the bullets.
The ones that barreled into his lower back when he was 14 and ricocheted around his insides until they lodged into his legs. After surgeons removed them during multiple operations, one lasting four hours, he needed a court order to get them back.
By law, doctors weren’t allowed to give him the bullets.
It took more than a year, but they were eventually returned. And he was proud of them.
Wanting the bullets back was a guy thing, a police investigator told the family. But it was more than that. Cameron Smith used to look at the two bullets, one smashed in half, as a reminder he could get through anything. A reminder of when his life became a parade of nurses, wheelchair depression and physical-therapy dread.
A reminder that he made it.
It’s harder to look at the bullets now, as an 18-year-old, because they’re also a reminder of all the damage done – and how far he still has to go. Yes, Cameron learned to walk again and ultimately received his GED certificate.
But the bullets are a reminder that Feb. 29, 2016 – and the cafeteria at Madison Schools – will be with him forever.
They're a reminder of all the ways he will never be normal again.
…
The first time I met Cameron, his mom was in rehab. And he showed me those bullets within 15 minutes of our first conversation.
In his room at home, the only light comes from a flat-screen television he sits too close to. These days, this is where Cameron spends most of his time. In the winter, because of the cold, it hurts to go outside. And in any weather, it hurts to do much at all.
Cameron was shot during lunch.
Question: What made you decide to do certain cuts, like the one above, throughout the piece?
BieryGolick: I kind of look at it like a chapter book. I want it to be like bam. I want you to go to the next section. I want to keep you reading. A lot of that happens in the editing process. I’ll jump all over the place.
At first, he thought it was a paintball gun. He felt something burn and saw red on his clothes. He stepped toward the shooter, thinking this was some type of prank, and collapsed onto the ground.
He broke his hand.
When he looked up, the cafeteria was almost empty. His friend was on the floor beside him screaming. A nurse rolled Cameron onto his back. That’s when he realized the red seeping through his clothes was blood, not paint.
Question: Was Cameron very open about sharing the details of this day?
BieryGolick: I would say yes, he was very open, he never really said he didn't want to answer any questions. It was definitely a process. I got into a rhythm spending an afternoon or few hours with him and his family about once a month. My goal was to get one new piece of information each time I spent time with him.
Four years later, Cameron lives life in constant pain – even if you can’t always tell, because he doesn’t want anyone to feel sorry for him. He's glad he was shot that day, instead of any other terrified students in the lunchroom. He knew he could handle it.
“The shooting wasn’t the worst thing to happen to me,” he says.
Cameron was 4 years old when he found his uncle on the basement floor, dead from a drug overdose. Cameron tried to wake him up, but he didn’t move. With no father around, this man had been his hero.
Question: There’s a lot of jumps for this piece. How did you make them so smooth?
BieryGolick: I wish I had a great answer but a lot of it is feel. I read stuff out loud. I will write myself a note. I’m losing the reader in this.
He was 12 when he realized his mom used drugs. She would say she was going to Dollar General and not return for days. When she did come back, she would go straight to her room and close the door.
Cameron missed 80 days of school and failed seventh grade.
During that time, his mom cooked methamphetamine in their home, which he said often made him sick. He would go to his aunt’s house for a few days and start to feel better. Then, he’d return home. He remembers his mom picking up prescriptions for his allergies and nothing else.
Allergy medication, such as Claritin D, can be used to make meth. He remembers he didn't always get the medication he needed.
Cameron was still in the hospital, after the shooting in 2016, when someone stole his PlayStation from the home where he lived with his grandmother, Mel. He believes his mother stole it. She denies this.
He was 14.
At 17, Cameron went to his dad’s side of the family for Christmas and asked where his father was. The police were probably looking for him, a cousin replied. After all, Cameron’s father owed thousands of dollars in child support.
Question: There is a lot of discussion about warrants and arrests and illegal behavior in this story. How did you go about confirming this information for your story?
BieryGolick: There were a lot of documents and court records and police records that I went through that backed up what’s in the story. Part of my initial work with this story was covering the school shooting. Because of this, I had the entire investigative file from the sheriff’s office, 911 calls, interviews with the shooter, and interviews with witnesses. I covered the court case, so I had documents from the shooter’s trial. I also had custody records from Cameron, which clarified a lot of things with his mom and the drug use. I wouldn’t feel comfortable writing the things I wrote if it were just from Cameron or his grandmother’s words, so this was how I corroborated a lot of those details.
“It wouldn’t be Christmas without a warrant,” the cousin told him.
…
Inside Cameron’s game room, there is a poster tucked away in the corner. If the door is open, you can barely see it. It’s signed by dozens of old classmates – given to him while he was recovering.
“Get well soon,” it says.
“Madison Mohawk Strong,” it says.
After months in a wheelchair, he eventually felt good enough to go to a school dance. The purpose was to raise money for shooting victims at the school.
In the cafeteria, the bullet marks in the lunchroom tables were still visible.
The shooter was someone with deep roots in this rural community, about 40 miles north of Cincinnati. Someone with relatives on the school staff, and a relative who would later run for school board. Someone the community never completely turned their backs on.
Cameron only moved to the area a few months before the shooting.
As time passed, and a new school year started, Cameron and two other students sued the shooter, who pleaded guilty to four counts of attempted murder and was sentenced to juvenile detention until he turns 21.
Twice recently, the boy who was shot called the boy who shot him “the victim.” And that’s what it felt like to Cameron. At some point, he started to feel like the one who did something wrong. Like an outcast who would make the community happier if he just left.
After the lawsuit, some of the very kids who signed the poster wishing him well began mocking him. They clapped near his face when he wasn’t looking, startling him, and he started to think some students had only been nice to him so they could say they knew the kid who got shot.
It’s been almost four years since the shooting, and Cameron is still in physical therapy. He has a service dog, named Honor, that wears a patch: “Not all wounds are visible.”
To this day, Cameron sometimes collapses to the ground because of loud noises. He’s 18 now, with a full beard. The kind of beard his grandmother wishes he would trim.
Question: What made you add details like this to the story?
BieryGolick: I remember reading Steven King and remembering can you get to the point. When I go out to an interview, I am always looking around. I am writing little things like that. If we are outside and it’s snowing I'll write that. I try to pay attention to their body language, if they cry - what question made them cry. When did their demeanor change? You want to have more and cut back because that’s when you lose the reader. It is a learning process. What’s happening in the background can be more important.
Cameron often wears a patch on his back, under his clothes. This patch is linked to a machine that transmits small electrical shocks to ease his pain. It shuts off automatically after 30 minutes, but he usually turns it back on.
Before the shooting, Cameron had been diagnosed with scoliosis, a curved spine condition that can cause back pain. The shooting left him with a cracked femur, nerve damage and arthritis. The bullets also struck his tailbone, exacerbating his scoliosis.
Cameron applied for public assistance because his doctors advise him not to work. It would be too hard on his body, they say. His grandmother, who is 64 and had brain surgery in 2004, cuts their grass.
Question: This part of the story is really just wonderful and stuck out for me the most; how and why did you decide to compare Cameron’s condition to his grandmother’s condition?
BieryGolick: I think that I was just trying to show that he feels stuck because he can’t work and because he’s still in a community that he doesn’t necessarily feel likes him all that much. He just wants to move on, but he can’t really move on, so he feels stuck in that regard. Through that specific example of mowing the grass, I was just trying to get at that. Most kids his age that’re living with a grandparent who’s 60 years old or so that have medical issues would be cutting the grass, and he can’t cut the grass. So, that was just a way to show his overall situation.
On a scale from one to 10, Cameron says he usually wakes up at a pain level of three or four. That pain, sometimes an aching, pulling or stabbing in his back, gets worse throughout the day. Even when he’s not doing much.
By the time he goes to bed, it can be an eight or nine.
Cameron used to dream about becoming an entrepreneur or an engineer. Now he dreams of going to Ohio State for esports – the burgeoning sport of competitive video gaming. But because of his inability to work, and his family’s limited income, even that only seems like a dream.
Cameron plays a lot of video games. To do that, he alternates between sitting and standing, because it hurts to stay in one position too long. Still, he says video games take his mind off the situation.
Even the shooting ones.
...
In many ways, Cameron is stuck. He had to become a man before he became a teenager.
It’s easy to forget he’s just a boy who drinks Mountain Dew out of beer steins he cools in the freezer. A boy who speaks with a lisp and can’t cook much more than macaroni and cheese or TV dinners.
Another boy shot that day, Cooper Caffrey, spoke in court when the shooter was sentenced. In front of a throng of reporters and tearful family members, Cooper forgave the boy who took his own pain out on his peers.
Cooper and Cameron are no longer friends. Some of this was because Cooper didn’t want to be around Cameron’s mom abusing drugs, and some of it was because of their opposing reactions to the shooting.
The shooter told police he was upset about his parents’ broken relationship and resented his father for fighting with him about grades. The teenager said he was always grounded. After being arrested, a police officer asked the boy why he did what he did.
“So I wouldn’t have to go back home,” he said.
Cameron didn’t like school, but still enjoyed it more than living with his mom. He said he started taking anti-depressants before the shooting and even thought about suicide. Still, the shooter’s explanation made him angry.
“At least your father cared enough to get on you,” he said.
…
When Cameron's mother completed a court-ordered rehab program in 2018, she visited her son. He retreated to his room. It had been five months since he last saw her.
A part of him wished she’d been sent to jail, and more than a part of him thought she eventually would.
Christina Smith is barely 5 feet tall. She is 36 years old and, despite her flaws, is full of laughter and energy and seems to delight in bothering her son.
Cameron stopped calling her “mom” when his grandmother got custody of him – something he works on in counseling. He says Christina is more like his sister, or “a friend whose name is Mom.”
It’s sometime before Christmas, and Cameron is listening to music so loud it rattles the house. His mom says he got that from her.
Christina walks into his room with a piece of cardboard almost as big as she is. She turns on the lights because she wants to show her son. A friend in rehab made it for her, and she looks proud. But Cameron laughs at her because only one person signed it.
She smiles and turns off the lights.
His mom returns a half-hour later and hands Cameron a Bible. She also gives him a pamphlet with the word “acceptance” on the front.
“Don’t do drugs,” she says.
Cameron doesn’t respond, so his mom places the Bible in his lap.
“I don’t need this,” he says. “I already know not to do drugs because of you.”
…
Cameron’s grandmother is sitting in a dark living room watching “The Price is Right.”
Behind her is a small computer monitor showing camera feeds from the front driveway and backyard. Mel had them installed after her daughter, Cameron’s mother, overdosed here in 2017.
Christina fell off the toilet and Mel couldn’t move her. She tried pumping her chest until paramedics arrived. They gave Christina multiple doses of Narcan before she came to.
Mel said doctors almost amputated her daughter’s arm, but Christina seems to be doing better now. Mel hasn’t seen her sober like this in several years.
On a winter day in 2018, their living room is covered in boxes.
Christina is staying with Cameron and his grandmother until she can find her own place. She smokes a cigarette by the front door. And when she sits down, after complaining about the lack of seating, she puts her feet on the only chair left as Cameron walks in.
The teenager pulls her feet off and sits down. Christina then rests her head on his shoulder, and he brushes her off.
“I’m barely touching you,” she says.
Cameron is eating a bag of potato chips, and she puts her head on him again. He elbows her away. When he takes another bite, his mom smashes the chips into his face. Cameron chases her into the room with the camera feeds and the bathroom Christina once overdosed in.
She laughs as her son takes a bowl of french onion dip and splatters thick globs of it into her hair. It might not sound like it, but this was a sweet moment.
They looked happy.
Question: How did you write this scene? Did you observe and take notes about what you saw?
BieryGolick: I think that a lot of times, if you are so worried about writing down every single thing that somebody says exactly how they say it, you don’t really listen to them, and you miss the context. I’m just experiencing something with someone and having a conversation, and then, when the conversation is over, I’ll go and scribble down everything I remember. For this story, I believe that was the method I used. There was a gas station right up the road from their house, and, basically, every time I finished hanging out with them, I would go to that gas station, and I would park and write notes for about half an hour. So, the story with the chips and the mom smashing stuff on his face was probably like this.
…
For a long time, Cameron didn’t know where his dad was. His father’s name is not on his birth certificate. And when his grandmother got custody of him, he spoke to his dad for the first time in years.
Cameron told him he wanted to live with Mel but gave his phone number to his father. He got a few texts, but that eventually stopped, and he felt abandoned all over again.
Mel gained custody of Cameron because his mother was evicted from her home – a home described in court documents as “deplorable.” It was infested with lice; the kitchen sink didn’t work, and cat urine stained the furniture.
Cameron has seen his mom with a needle in her arm and used to get calls from drug dealers demanding to speak with her. Cameron said his mom often begged for money by saying she needed to feed her kid and then used that money for drugs.
Once, the dishes in their home piled so high they started to mold. Cameron didn’t know how to use the dishwasher.
In 2015, according to court documents, Christina illegally sold Cameron’s prescription medication and tested positive for heroin. A judge granted his grandmother temporary custody that summer. That’s when Cameron started going to Madison Schools.
When Mel was granted permanent custody on Jan. 11, 2016, Cameron still thought something could go wrong. He’d learned not to trust adults and wanted to see the paperwork himself.
When it finally came in the mail, more than a month later, they celebrated. It was a Friday, and Mel picked him up from school to surprise him. They ate at China King Buffet. On Saturday, they went to Kohl’s and, hoping for something to signify a fresh start, Mel bought him new pants, a shirt and Nike shoes.
The paramedics cut those clothes off him on Monday. And he wouldn’t see them again for months, until pictures from the police investigation were released to the media.
Cameron saw his bloody pants on the news.
Question: How hard was it to write this story emotionally?
BieryGolick: The hardest part for me wasn’t really the emotional stuff, I took a year and a half to get to know him and his family. When writing about them I do not want to hurt them, but I have to remind myself I am not writing it for them, that ends up being the hardest part of writing it.
…
This January, Cameron and his grandmother drive 45 minutes each way for physical therapy. They use a truck Cameron’s grandfather gave him when he turned 18. He always promised Cameron the truck, as long as he stayed off drugs and didn’t get anyone pregnant.
Today, Cameron's in the pool. It’s the place he feels the least amount of pain. The water is warm, and there are at least two fans blowing to keep the surrounding area cool.
His dog whines when he gets into the water.
After warmups, Cameron steps up onto a box in the pool and steps down. He does this repeatedly. Then, he stands on his toes and stretches his legs. He jogs laps and makes small talk with his physical therapist.
On one end of the pool is Cameron. On the other are mostly women with gray hair. He might be in less pain here, but he’d rather be anywhere else.
Cameron wants to live in Hawaii. It’s always warm there, he says, and the people are nice. He’s lived in Hawaii before, when his grandfather had a construction job there. It’s a place where he says his mom only smoked marijuana.
Question: I find that the grandfather is a very interesting character in this story, and I believe that’s because of the information you chose to share about him in this story. How do you choose what information best portrays the characters in the story?
BieryGolick: The little details are what make a story. A lot of times, when I’m initially writing the story I put so many little details in there. I throw everything at it, and I take the stuff I don’t need out later. Maybe it’s a good detail, but it doesn’t really fit into the context of the story. I just try to gather as many details as I can, and then I select what details add something to the story. I will use one sentence or a couple of sentences that give the characters depth and the story some texture.
When asked what he wants his future to look like, Cameron responds without hesitation:
“Nothing like it is now.”
“How do you think you’re going to get out?”
“I have no clue," he says.
Question: What made you choose to end with the last quote?
BieryGolick: The “I have no clue” tells us again that I have no clue this kid is going to make it.
