Dennis McDougal (1947-2025), who has been called “LA’s No. 1 Muckraker," invested over 50 years chronicling Hollywood, psychedelics, mental health, true crime, and media misdemeanors.
Before turning his attention to writing books full-time, McDougal reported on the glamorous and occasionally corrupt aspects of show business as a staff writer for the Los Angeles Times. He also contributed regularly to the New York Times and produced documentaries for both CNN and PBS. With a B.A. and M.A. in journalism from UCLA, McDougal furthered his postgraduate education at Stanford University with a yearlong Knight Fellowship in psychology and law. As an adjunct professor, he taught journalism and creative writing at UCLA and the California State Universities at Fullerton and Long Beach.
His journalism has won dozens of honors including the George Foster Peabody Award, Fordham University’s Ann M. Sperber Award for the nation’s best media biography, and an Edgar nomination from the Mystery Writers of America for best true crime.
In a career spanning over 50 years, McDougal wrote hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles.
His last book, Citizen Wynn: A Sin City Saga of Power, Lust, and Blind Ambition (2025), chronicles the history of (dis)organized crime in Las Vegas. With the publication in 2020 of Operation White Rabbit: LSD, the DEA and the Fate of the Acid King (Skyhorse Publishing), Dennis McDougal had authored a total of thirteen books. Not that he was superstitious, but he had completed work on No. 14 and it went to print -- just before his untimely passing due to a vehicle collision. Citizen Wynn is a no-holds-barred biography centered on sex, sizzle, and the Mafia, in Sin City (aka Las Vegas) USA.
In partnership with Revelations Productions, McDougal had been producing a documentary film about the late civil rights figure Rodney King -- the work continues on that film. He was also at work on The Acid Chronicles, a documentary history of the evolution of psychedelics, from CIA abuse and party drugs to ongoing breakthroughs in treatment of mental illness in the 21st Century.
A CNN producer during the O.J. Simpson murder trial, he also co-produced Inventing L.A.: The Chandlers and Their Times (2009) for PBS.