FCIR-Supported Film Scheduled to Screen at Double Exposure Investigative Film Festival – Florida Center for Investigative Reporting

A documentary short supported by the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting will screen October 12 at the Double Exposure Investigative Film Festival in Washington, D.C.

Filmmakers Jess Swanson and Jason Fitzroy Jeffers.

The film, “Drowning by Sunrise,” is an investigation of the drowning death of a black teenager who was chased by police in South Florida. The film will be shown in Double Exposure’s “Crossing Borders” workshop session, which will include four near-finished documentary shorts and a panel of filmmakers and investigative journalists who will provide critiques. “Drowning by Sunrise” will be released publicly through FCIR and partners in November.

The filmmakers are Jason Fitzroy Jeffers, whose work has appeared in the Miami Herald and at film festivals such as Sundance and TIFF, and Jess Swanson, a journalist who is the senior editor of American Airlines’ American Way and Celebrated Living magazines and a lecturer at the University of Miami.

Founded in 2010, FCIR is a nonprofit organization that supports public-interest journalism in Florida. The organization’s focus is now on large multimedia projects. Last year, FCIR supported a collaborative reporting project on climate change with public radio stations WMFE in Orlando, WUSF in Tampa, and WLRN in Miami. This year, FCIR’s forthcoming projects include the documentary by Jeffers and Swanson and a podcast series.