Arizona Daily Star reporter Caitlin Schmidt's top 5 stories of 2021
![]() |
We are sharing Arizona Daily Star reporters' and photographers' favorite work from 2021.
Caitlin Schmidt is the Star’s solutions reporter, covering people and places working to fix social problems and fill gaps in equity. She also writes sports features and investigations.
(5) updates to this series since Updated
"Our racing industry lost a legend, our community lost an innovator and we lost an incredible friend," said Tucson Dragway track manager Matt DeYoung.
Grants have helped authorizes here with testing nearly 2,000 sex-assault kits, resulting in 915 DNA profiles that generated 464 hits, which means the identity of a potential suspect.
This story and video take you inside the room as local law officers are taught how to de-escalate situations when people are in mental-health or substance-use crisis.
Tucson police recently gave six known drug dealers a chance to turn their lives around and avoid prosecution that could send them to prison for years. It was the first time Tucson has used this strategy, found to be effective in other cities in reducing drug sales and violent crime.
Desiree Cook is the founder of nonprofit I Am You 360, which serves youths in foster care by providing customized personal hygiene products, mentoring experience, life skills training and most recently, short-term housing. DeGeneres was impressed.


