Keri Blakinger

Keri Lynn Blakinger (born June 15, 1984) is an American journalist and author. She is an investigative reporter for The Marshall Project, where she covers criminal justice.

As a child, she competed as a figure skater at regional and national levels, first in singles and then in pair skating with Mark Ladwig. She struggled with bulimia during her competitions and, after her skating career ended, she developed a drug addiction in high school and college. She continued to deal with this and other problems while attending Rutgers University and later Cornell University before being arrested in December 2010 for possession of heroin. She accepted a plea deal for two and a half years in prison. The experience caused her to change her focus to journalism and trying to improve the penal system in the United States through her reporting.

Blakinger worked for a number of news outlets in the late 2010's, including the ''Ithaca Times'', the ''New York Daily News'', and the ''Houston Chronicle'' before joining The Marshall Project in 2019. Her work has resulted in the charging of a prison rape perpetrator and several reforms to the prison policies regarding women and the physical and culinary options afforded inmates. In 2022, she authored a memoir, ''Corrections in Ink: A Memoir'', in which she describes major events of her life, including her addiction, arrest, and observations on prison life, including racism she observed while incarcerated. Provided by Wikipedia