Senior court and crime journalist Janessa Ekert has worked as a journalist for 13 years. After completing a double degree at James Cook University in Townsville – studying journalism and arts, majoring in French, history and English – Janessa cut her teeth as a corporate lifestyle magazine journalist before making the jump to daily news. She has been a newspaper journalist for 10 years. In that time Janessa has covered sport, business, council, politics, entertainment and community news stories. Janesssa now specialises in court and crime reporting, which has been a focus for the past eight years. In 2020, a road safety campaign and a crime feature earned Janessa two finalist nominations in the Clarions, the Queensland State Media Awards. Janessa has worked as a senior journalist for the Daily Mercury and Cairns Post covering regional news for the bulk of her career.