Dan is an investigative reporter on WBEZ’s Government & Politics Team. Since joining the station in 2018, Dan has won three National Edward R. Murrow Awards, including the 2022 investigative reporting prize, for a series of stories on sexual abuse of lifeguards at Chicago’s beaches and pools. The “Buried Secrets” series prompted criminal charges, reforms and the resignations of the Park District’s chief executive and board president. Those stories also won first prize in the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Awards for Investigative Reporting.
Dan is a three-time winner of the Chicago Headline Club’s Watchdog Award for Excellence in Public Interest Reporting and was awarded the Headline Club’s 2018 Anne Keegan Award for his feature stories about immigrants. His work also earned first prize for investigative reporting in the Education Writers Association’s national awards in 2014.
Dan joined WBEZ from the Chicago Sun-Times. His investigations for the newspaper’s “Watchdogs” team led to the resignation of a Chicago Public Schools CEO and a federal fraud case against the leader of the state’s largest charter-school network. Dan previously was a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Chicago News Cooperative (Chicago section of the New York Times) and the Chicago Tribune, where he covered the City Hall beat, the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.
Dan was born in Chicago and graduated from Maine West High School in Des Plaines and the University of Missouri School of Journalism. His first language was Greek and he is fluent in Spanish.
Dan Mihalopoulos
Stories by Dan Mihalopoulos
Accountants pulled into dispute between investors in popular Chicago steakhouse
The Plante Moran accounting firm is fighting a subpoena as investors in Maple & Ash allege pandemic relief fraud by the Gold Coast restaurant.
Civil rights group says Chicago should take tougher action against cops linked to Oath Keepers
The Southern Poverty Law Center urged Chicago officials to reconsider a decision not to take disciplinary action against eight officers connected to the Oath Keepers.
Chicago’s top cop defends clearing officers with connections to extremist group
Newly released records show officers acknowledged ties to anti-government Oath Keepers – but said their involvement was limited.
Chicago Police won’t discipline nine officers with extremist group ties
Mayor Brandon Johnson and Police Superintendent Larry Snelling had earlier vowed to rid the department of officers on the anti-government group Oath Keepers rolls.
Veteran Cook County tax appeals board commissioner takes big lead in Democratic primary
Larry Rogers Jr. faced heavy spending from Assessor Fritz Kaegi, who backed newcomer Larecia Tucker. “He should have kept his money,” Rogers said Tuesday.
Longtime Cook County tax appeal commissioner faces a big-money push to replace him
Larry Rogers, Jr. has been on the Board of Review for 20 years, but Assessor Fritz Kaegi is spending heavily to help Rogers’s primary challenger.
U.S. Rep. Jesús “Chuy” García faces a Democratic primary challenge from the right
But being famous on Fox News has not yet translated into much campaign cash for Chicago Ald. Raymond Lopez’s congressional bid.
The UIC campus cop with extremist ties is banned from testifying in Cook County court cases
The officer continued to work for the state university, despite acknowledging he signed up for the anti-government Oath Keepers years ago.
New Illinois law should help survivors of gender violence who sue their employers
The law, which takes effect Jan. 1, is intended to hold employers accountable for failing to act on complaints of workplace violence.
Two former lifeguards sue the Chicago Park District, saying they suffered sexual abuse when they were minors
Two women allege “childhood sexual abuse” by male supervisors in the years before a scandal at the city’s beaches and pools.