Bill Keller Leaves NY Times to Lead Journalism Nonprofit

Former executive editor and current columnist for the New York Times Bill Keller is leaving the Gray Lady to head up a journalism nonprofit.

Keller will become editor-in-chief of The Marshall Project, a nonpartisan and nonpartisan venture devoted to criminal justice reporting. The project was formed by Neil Barsky, a Wall Street hedge fund manager and former reporter, who recently made the documentary Koch (about the mayor, not the brothers).

“It’s a chance to build something from scratch, which I’ve never done before, and to use all the tools that digital technology offers journalists in terms of ways to investigate and to present on a subject that really matters personally,” Keller said on Monday. He said the venture is intended to be “a bit of a wake-up call to a public that has gotten a little numbed to the scandal that our criminal justice system is.”

Keller differentiated himself from recent free agents like Nate Silver and Ezra Klein, and instead likened the move to that of Paul Steiger, who left the Wall Street Journal to help found ProPublica.

Keller joined the Times in 1984, and served as executive editor from 2003-2011 before he was succeeded by Jill Abramson.

[h/t New York Times]

[Image via Todd Heisler / The New York Times]

——
>> Follow Evan McMurry (@evanmcmurry) on Twitter

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!