Will James
Audio Documentary Producer
About
As an audio documentary producer, Will James creates deeply-reported podcasts and specials that illuminate complicated and polarizing issues in the Seattle region. He hosted, co-reported, and co-produced Lost Patients, a 2024 podcast series by KUOW and The Seattle Times that explores why people with serious mental illness cycle between emergency rooms, jail, and the streets.
Will previously worked at KNKX Public Radio, where he created the 2020 podcast Outsiders and co-created the 2022 podcast The Walk Home. Prior to working in audio journalism, he reported for newspapers in his home state of New York.
Podcasts
Stories
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Lost Patients live show explores what's next for mental healthcare
In the podcast "Lost Patients," journalists Will James, Sydney Brownstone ,and Esmy Jimenez explored why so many people with severe mental illness in Washington state are not getting the care they need.
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Seattle’s troubled past and present suggest a new approach to mental health
The story of Seattle’s first known homeless man and how he was treated speaks to the continuing problems with mental health care 170 years later.
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Vulnerable patients caught in ‘churn’ between Washington mental health care systems face life and death circumstances
Lost Patients is a deeply-reported, six-part docuseries examining the difficulties of treating serious mental illness through the lens of one city's past, present and future. With real-life testimonials from patients, families, and professionals on the front lines, Lost Patients provides a real, solutions-oriented look at how we got stuck here...and what we might do to break free.
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50 years ago, many psychiatric hospitals closed. Did that cause today's mental health crisis?
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Who was Lillian Massey? A journey to Northern State psychiatric hospital
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His mom worried he’d wind up dead. But getting him committed was nearly impossible
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A boy named Adam: When psychosis spills onto Seattle streets (Lost Patients podcast)
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National
Tenants at risk of homelessness were evicted from a building. Here's what happened
The former tenants of the Merkle Hotel in Tacoma, Wash., struggled to find housing after they were forced from their building in 2018. Many didn't have a place to go.
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The Merkle Hotel in Tacoma was 'an unofficial safety net' for its tenants. Then it was taken away
Before October 31, 2018, the Merkle Hotel in Tacoma was home for tenants who couldn’t afford much else. That is, until a developer decided it was time to cater to a crowd that could pay more and evicted those who could not.