Abby Hoover
Managing Editor

A young radio journalist for KCUR-FM, the National Public Radio affiliate in Kansas City, Mo., died April 25 after suffering a gunshot wound in her apartment.

Aviva Okeson-Haberman, 24, was apparently struck by a bullet that pierced her first-floor window in the 2900 block of Lockridge Avenue, her station reported.

When a colleague became concerned about Okeson-Haberman not responding on Friday, April 23, she went to check on her. She then called authorities to conduct a welfare check and while waiting, she and others saw a bullet hole in the corner of a bedroom window and could see Okeson-Haberman wounded inside, the colleague said on air the following Monday.

Kansas City Police Department (KCPD) Capt. Dave Jackson said her death is being investigated as a homicide. Last year, Kansas City suffered the highest number of homicides in the city’s history, recording 182. To date, 53 Kansas Citians have died by gun violence this year.

Okeson-Haberman joined KCUR in June 2019 as the Missouri politics and government reporter, having interned at the station a year earlier. She impressed the newsroom with her work ethic, diligence, conscientiousness and eagerness to learn, Dan Margolies, senior reporter and editor at KCUR, said in a moving tribute.

“Aviva was brilliant,” KCUR news director Lisa Rodriguez said. “Even as an intern, her approach to storytelling and her ability to hold those in power accountable paralleled many a veteran reporter.”

Okeson-Haberman planned to move to Lawrence, Kan., to transition into a new role covering social issues and criminal justice for the Kansas News Service, a statewide reporting partnership based at KCUR.

“Aviva was a creative, thorough, challenging and insightful reporter. Always prepared, she told the full and complex story of our city in one of the most challenging years in its history,” Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas tweeted. “Her life showed us her compassion for those who too often were voiceless. Her death lays bare our gravest unsolved epidemic and the preventable tragedies too many families endure.”

In her nearly two years at KCUR, Aviva covered a host of issues, ranging from corruption in Clay County and medical marijuana to the conflicting pandemic restrictions in differing Kansas City area cities and inequities in the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines. She had recently worked on an audio diary of nurses fighting COVID-19.

Okeson-Haberman was a 2019 graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism at the University of Missouri (MU). While there, she earned many awards, including the Sigma Delta Chi Award for investigative reporting for her investigation of Missouri’s elder abuse hotline, which prompted an investigation by the Missouri attorney general.

Fellow reporters, friends, professors, elected officials shared memories, stories and the memorable work of Okeson-Haberman on Twitter throughout the week. The Northeast News staff mourns her passing along with her family, friends and colleagues at KCUR.

Aviva is survived by her mother and father, her two younger sisters and her maternal grandparents. Plans for a memorial service are pending.

KCUR, the MU School of Journalism and KBIA have created the Aviva Okeson-Haberman Legacy Fund to support aspiring journalists who, like Aviva, show potential to change the world through journalism, honoring her tremendous commitment to curiosity, compassion and the truth. Contact David M. Fulk, Director of Philanthropic Giving, at david@kcur.org or (816) 235-2812.