Grant LaFleche

Investigative Journalist

St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada

I am a veteran investigative journalist with the Hamilton Spectator in Ontario, Canada. I have been nominated for 29 Ontario Newspaper Awards and five National Newspaper Awards, four Canadian Association of Journalists Awards, and the Michener Award for public service journalism.

Grant LaFleche

Investigative Journalist

St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada

Featured
COVID-19 conspiracy theories are spreading online like a virus. An inside look at a dangerous misinformation movement that’s spilling into the real world
Using hashtags like #nomorelockdowns as a signal flare to attract new followers, online communities have grown rapidly by providing common ground for believers in a kaleidoscope of conspiracy theories and pushing claims that the pandemic is an elaborate hoax to undermine liberty. Like the virus, the hashtag #nomorelockdowns has spread across borders, taking root in India, the U.S., the U.K. and Canada, where its use has intensified.
The Toronto Star
News Features Investigations
Hamilton’s neo-Nazis claim to be part of the ‘fastest growing nationalist community in Canada’
Group responsible for white nationalist stickering campaign has more than 1,000 followers on its main social-media channel RELATED PART 1: Hate in Ontario is at a ‘linchpin moment, we’re either going to keep it in the grenade or we’re going to see some th
Hamilton Spectator
Investigations News Features neo-nazi hate far right
Featured
Investigative series: Missing Since April
A special three part investigation into the unsolved case of missing woman Ashley Simpson, who vanished in the B.C. Mountains in 2016.
The St. Catharines Standard
Investigations News Features
Featured
Investigative Series: ALL THE CHAIR'S MEN
Port Colborne councillor and NPCA manager David Barrick asks regional treasurer Jason Burgess to start praising D'Angelo to other regional employees in advance of his eventually hiring. Doing so would earn Burgress "influence" with D'Angelo, Barrick says in an email.
The St. Catharines Standard
News Features National Newspaper Award winner Ontario Newspaper Award Winner Investigations
Racism, misogyny and antisemitism: Inside the secret life of a Hamilton paralegal
In one, he was a university graduate, a paralegal student and the president of student Conservative Party political clubs. His other life was lived online, in a dark network of chat rooms, podcasts and websites, where he fomented racial hatred, violent misogyny and antisemitism.
The Hamilton Spectator
Investigations News Features neo-nazi hate far right
Featured
Gold, diamonds and psychic guidance. How an Ontario man took millions from investors and left them with nothing
Richard Mori promised investors riches. His wife Bonnie helped gain their trust. A Torstar investigation untangles what happened to the millions investors gave to Richard’s mining company.
The Toronto Star
Investigations News Features
Something is making Brian Korz sick — he says the mystery illness is from toxic formaldehyde at his former Beamsville workplace
Brian Korz believes he is the victim of long-term formaldehyde poisoning. The chemical, linked to cancer and neurological degenerative conditions, is widely used in Ontario and until recently, without much in the way of safety precautions.
The Hamilton Spectator
Investigations News Features
Hate in Ontario is at a ‘linchpin moment, we’re either going to keep it in the grenade or we’re going to see some things explode’
Warning: this story contains disturbing content Looking down on the city of Hamilton from a snowy cliff, their hands wrapped in boxing gloves, the small group of white nationalists stood shoulder-to-shoulder and raised their right arms in the Nazi salute.
Hamilton Spectator
Investigations News Features
The lions ate his tiger, police say. Inside the troubled journey of Ontario’s Tiger King and the exotic animal’s grisly death
Mark Drysdale said he has done nothing wrong and that his zoos help educate the public about tigers and other at-risk species. Tamara the tiger died among the old-growth yellow birch and sugar maple trees of a dense Ontario forest. She was mauled by a pack of lions inside the lumber-and-wire enclosure where they all lived.
The Toronto Star
Investigations News Features
Life disrupted as COVID-19 arrived in Niagara
This is a story of a year of struggle and survival, of frustration and tears, of death and of hope. Part 1 of 3.
The St. Catharines Standard
News Features Investigations
Featured
The Wolf in Priest's Clothing: Complete series
From the age of 9 until he was 12 William O'Sullivan was sexually abused by Catholic priest Donald Grecco. That abuse set O'Sullivan on a path that landed him a Catholic boys school infamous for clergy abuse, and eventually in prison. Decades after it happened, O'Sullivan reported what Grecco did to him as a boy and his one-time priest is now facing a prison sentence.| This series won an Ontario Newspaper Award and a National Newspaper Award.
The St. Catharines Standard
News Features Investigations Ontario Newspaper Award Winner National Newspaper Award winner
HEART OF THE CITY: Those left behind
A wisp of a man with shoulder-length grey hair and a wild beard, he was an unnoticed fixture downtown, often wandering the streets in an oversized coat draped over his grey clothing. Tom drew little attention to himself as he walked past those who have learned not see people like him. He was so invisible, no one seems to know for sure what his name was.
The St. Catharines Standard
News Features

About

Grant LaFleche

Journalism

Writing

Narrative writing

Research

Investigative journalism

data analysis

data visualization

Podcasting

Photography

Video/sound editing

Interviewing

Grant LaFleche is an award-winning investigative journalist with the Hamilton Spectator in Hamilton Ontario. He was previously a seconded member of the Toronto Star's investigations team while working with St. Catharines Standard in Niagara, Ontario.

Since he started at the Standard in 1998, Grant has been nominated for 29 Ontario Newspaper Awards, where he has been twice nominated as the journalist of the year. He has also been nominated for five National Newspaper Awards, the Canadian Journalism Foundation Jackman Award for excellence in journalism and four Canadian Association of Journalists awards.

He has also been nominated for the Michener Award for public service journalism, the Canadian equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize gold medal for public service journalism.

His 2017 investigative series, The Wolf in Priest's Clothing, won the Ontario Newspaper Award for feature writing and the National Newspaper Award for local journalism.

His two-year investigation into corruption at Niagara's regional government played a major role in triggering an Ontario Ombudsman’s investigation into the Niagara Region and impacted the 2018 municipal election. That series won two Ontario Newspaper Awards, a National Newspaper Awards and a Canadian Association of Journalists Award. It also earned LaFleche his Michener nomination.

LaFleche was a member of the Toronto Star investigative team, focusing on long-term, hard-target investigative projects for a year-long secondment before joining the Spectator, where he continues his work as an investigative journalist.

With the Spectator, LaFleche has exposed the secret life of a Hamilton paralegal who lived online as a notorious neo-Nazi, showed how the "freedom convoy" has taken aim at the transgender community, and revealed a long-running identity theft and fraud scheme at a local retirement home. He also lead a Metroland join-paper investigation into the dramatic rise in hate crimes in Ontario.