Nailing With Numbers
"Neighborhoods for Sale" by Dan Mihalopoulos, Robert Becker and Darnell Little of the Chicago Tribune, is a fine example of using data-mining to expose widespread corruption. Here's how they documented Chicago's shady zoning practices:
In an unprecedented investigation of city development, the Tribune examined 5,700 zoning changes approved by the City Council over the last decade and recorded on sheets of paper clipped into binders in a City Hall office. The newspaper converted the paper records into an electronic database to perform an analysis of development beyond the scope of anything previously possible, even for city planners.
The investigation found that Chicago is a city where a building boom greased by millions of dollars in political donations to aldermen has remade the face of neighborhoods, changing the feel of the streets where people live and work.
Two more notable examples of data-mining are "Many on Shock Probation in Jefferson Rearrested" by Jason Riley in the Courier-Journal and "State-Issued Credit Cards' Use Runs Gamut" by Andrea Jones and Megan Clarke in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-code-overviewjan27,0,6181305.story
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007712230489
http://www.ajc.com/search/content/metro/stories/2007/12/22/pcards_1223.html