The Philadelphia Inquirer found itself reporting on its own newsroom Thursday, publicly acknowledging that confidential interview notes prepared by one of its senior editors somehow wound up in the hands of the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office during the investigation that led to the now-defunct racketeering prosecution of South Jersey Democratic power broker George E. Norcross III.
The extraordinary disclosure, detailed in a story by City Hall reporter Sean Collins Walsh, confirmed a central element first reported Wednesday by former Inquirer reporter Ralph Cipriano on his BigTrial blog. The New Jersey Globe republished Cipriano’s stories with his permission because of significant public interest in New Jersey in the failed prosecution and questions about how confidential journalistic materials became part of the state’s criminal case.
While confirming that editor Nancy Phillips’ 2019 interview notes ultimately became part of the state’s evidence file, the Inquirer emphatically rejected suggestions that either the newspaper or Phillips voluntarily provided them to prosecutors.
“The Inquirer did not turn over notes to state prosecutors” and was never subpoenaed for them, executive editor Gabriel Escobar wrote in a message to the newsroom after the Inkygate scandal began to emerge.
“We do not definitively know how the notes ended up with the state, but we do know it was not from us,” Escobar told Walsh.
The admission raises extraordinary questions about how confidential journalistic work product became evidence in one of the most consequential criminal prosecutions in modern New Jersey history.
It also revives a long and bitter history between Norcross and Philadelphia’s largest newspaper.
Norcross was a co-owner of The Philadelphia Inquirer from April 2012 until May 2014 through Interstate General Media, the investment group that purchased the newspaper. His ownership ended after a bruising internal battle with fellow owners Lewis Katz and H.F. “Gerry” Lenfest, which culminated in a court-ordered auction at which Norcross was bought out.
Since then, the Inquirer has devoted extensive investigative coverage to Norcross, particularly his influence over Camden politics, economic development projects, and New Jersey’s tax incentive programs. That reporting helped shape public scrutiny of the incentives and preceded the criminal investigation launched by the Attorney General’s embattled Office of Pubic Integrity and Accountability.
In June 2024, then-Attorney General Matthew Platkin announced a sweeping 13-count racketeering indictment against Norcross and five associates, alleging they used political influence and threats to control development along the Camden waterfront.
As part of pretrial discovery, prosecutors turned over Phillips’ interview notes to defense attorneys as part of the state’s evidence.
In February 2025, Superior Court Judge Peter Warshaw dismissed every count of the indictment against every defendant, ruling that even if prosecutors’ allegations were accepted as true, the conduct described did not constitute criminal extortion under New Jersey law. Earlier this year, the Appellate Division unanimously upheld Warshaw’s decision. Acting Attorney General Jennifer Davenport later declined to seek further review, effectively ending the prosecution.
It was through that discovery process that Norcross’ legal team obtained Phillips’ notes.
The Inquirer’s account answers one question but leaves the central mystery unresolved.
According to two anonymous sources cited by the newspaper, Phillips shared the notes with a third party for reasons unrelated to assisting law enforcement. One source said prosecutors did not receive the notes directly from Phillips. Another said the material appeared in discovery in an electronic folder labeled “Stier Documents,” an apparent reference to former state and federal prosecutor Edwin Stier.
Stier declined to comment.
Phillips also declined to comment, saying only that she was “not comfortable talking about the process of newsgathering.”
The Attorney General’s Office declined comment.
Although Escobar said the newspaper conducted an internal inquiry after learning prosecutors possessed the notes, the Inquirer acknowledged that it still does not know how confidential reporting material reached state investigators. They have not released a copy of their internal investigation.
Equally striking was what the newspaper declined to answer.
Walsh reported that Escobar refused to answer his own reporter’s questions about whether Phillips shared the notes with anyone outside the newsroom, including Stier. Escobar also declined to discuss whether Phillips or any other employee was disciplined following the newspaper’s internal review, saying only that the Inquirer does not comment on personnel matters.
The result is an unusual circumstance in which the newspaper’s own coverage acknowledges significant unanswered questions while reporting that its top editor would not answer several of those questions even for an Inquirer reporter.
The controversy erupted Wednesday after Cipriano reported that Norcross’ attorneys had obtained Phillips’ notes through criminal discovery and questioned how confidential newsroom materials found their way into prosecutors’ files.
Cipriano suggested there were only two possible explanations: that the Inquirer produced the notes in response to a subpoena or that Phillips voluntarily cooperated with investigators.
The Inquirer rejected both theories.
Escobar called Cipriano’s conclusions “unfounded and irresponsible speculation.”
“Speculation that Nancy Phillips, who has a long and distinguished track record as a reporter and editor, was working with state prosecutors is both false and outrageous,” Escobar said. “When we learned that state investigators had the notes, we conducted an inquiry and determined that the material was not provided to them by The Inquirer.”
At the same time, however, the newspaper confirmed several facts that had not previously been acknowledged publicly.
Escobar disclosed that Phillips interviewed former Cherry Hill Mayor Susan Bass Levin in 2019 after being approached by a source with “unique insights” into the Norcross matter. He also acknowledged that Phillips typed her notes and shared them internally with political reporters Andrew Seidman and Catherine Dunn, who were covering the Camden tax incentive investigation.
Escobar described Phillips as “not directly involved” in the reporting but serving as “a conduit for information only she could access.”
That disclosure appeared to contradict the publicly conveyed impression that Phillips was not involved in the newspaper’s Norcross coverage.
Norcross spokesman Dan Fee said the Inquirer’s own account confirmed two major points raised by Cipriano: that Phillips’ notes ultimately ended up in prosecutors’ hands and that Phillips participated in gathering information used in reporting about Norcross.
Fee also renewed questions about Phillips’ longtime relationship with the late Lewis Katz, a former Camden County freeholder and Norcross’s chief rival during the battle for control of the newspaper, and called on the Inquirer to conduct a public investigation into the episode.
The newspaper defended both its journalism and its reporters.
Seidman said he and reporter Catherine Dunn began investigating the Camden tax incentive program months before Phillips interviewed Bass Levin and emphasized that their work rested on interviews, emails, bank documents, property records, appraisals, and other government records.
“I stand by it 100%,” Seidman told the newspaper.
Former Inquirer editor John P. Martin, who supervised the coverage, likewise said Phillips neither edited nor advised reporters on stories involving Norcross, according to their coverage. The newspaper also noted that it never published a correction to its reporting on the Camden tax incentive program. The notes also included story ideas and discussed the need to obtain through New Jersey’s Open Public Records Act, which they did.
Even as it vigorously defended its journalism, the Inquirer acknowledged that the incident represented a breakdown in protecting confidential reporting materials.
Escobar concluded his message to the newsroom with what he described as an “important lesson.”
“The information we gather in the course of reporting should always be safeguarded,” he told his staff. “And no matter how well established a source-reporter relationship is, each interaction should establish clear parameters for the use of the information.”
When Walsh later asked how those comments related to prosecutors obtaining Phillips’ notes, Escobar offered a candid acknowledgment.
“The notes ended up with the state, so something went awry,” he wrote. “That part of the message is intended as a general reminder and not specific to the circumstances.”
Yet despite the newspaper’s unusually transparent decision to report on itself, the central questions that define Inkygate remain unanswered: Who was the third party that received Phillips’ notes? How did those notes move from that person into the possession of the Attorney General’s Office? Did prosecutors know where they came from? And why has no one involved been willing to explain the chain of custody?
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