Jennifer Bjorhus, longtime journalist and Star Tribune reporter, dies of brain cancer

Jennifer Bjorhus covered some of Minnesota’s biggest news stories over her 30-year journalism career, but it was her investigative work sparking changes that made her the most proud.

In her 16 years at the Star Tribune, she covered breaking news — from team reporting on the state’s largest fraud scheme of businessman Tom Petters in the early 2000s to taking part in the Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder in 2020. But in-depth stories like the 2018 series “Denied Justice” — a Pulitzer Prize finalist examining how Minnesota’s criminal justice system failed victims of rape and sexual assault — stuck with her.

“She is one of the giants in Minnesota journalism, who didn’t call attention to herself,” said James Shiffer, her editor for much of the past decade. “You knew when she wrote a story it would be bulletproof. She really got at the truth.”

Bjorhus, 59, of St. Paul, died Aug. 9 after a nine-month battle with glioblastoma.

Born and raised in Litchfield, Jennifer Ann Bjorhus was the youngest of three girls. It was clear from the beginning that she was inquisitive and curious about the world, exploring the neighboring swamp or biking around town, her sister Kari Bjorhus said. Her nursery school even once threatened to kick out the youngster for refusing to take a nap.

“That was so typical of Jenny not to want to miss anything,” she said. “She didn’t have time to nap.”

Bjorhus attended Carleton College in Northfield, where she learned Hindi and decided to pursue linguistics. After college, she worked odd jobs at a yarn cooperative and as a chauffeur driving Mickey Mouse characters before getting a master’s degree at the University of California, Berkeley. It was there that she decided to pivot to journalism. She wanted to make a difference and had long excelled at writing, her friends and family said.

“She really felt journalism was a calling,” Kari Bjorhus said.

Bjorhus worked eight years on the West Coast as a reporter at the Seattle Times, the Oregonian and the San Jose Mercury News. By 2002, she had returned to Minnesota to join the Pioneer Press, where she worked as a business reporter for six years. Emily Gurnon, who became best friends with Bjorhus when they were both at Berkeley, worked at the Pioneer Press, too.

“When Jen sunk her teeth into a story, she was absolutely relentless,” Gurnon said.

For years, the two friends would go on weekly walks along the Mississippi River, and it was a rare day that Bjorhus didn’t spend the stroll strategizing over how to approach sources or stressing about details in a difficult story, she said.

By 2008, Bjorhus had joined the Star Tribune. Business reporter Jackie Crosby knew her as a competitor at the Pioneer Press and was impressed by this new redhead “dynamo” who had just had a baby and tackled the job with unmatched energy. Zipping into the newsroom, coffee in hand, Bjorhus would immediately grab her phone and report nonstop, pressuring sources to answer her questions.

“I’ve never in my life encountered someone who was so focused,” Crosby said. “She was just so driven; she was singular in that way.”

In her career at the Star Tribune, she covered watchdog reporting, business news, criminal justice and the environment. No matter what her beat, Shiffer said, she was adept at distilling complex topics — from police accountability to banking — into compelling stories.

“I felt like she was the dream reporter. She could do it all,” he said, adding that she remained humble. “We’re here to tell the public the painful truths and uncover the injustices. She did it in a very self-effacing quality.”

Bjorhus was on a team in 2016 that found that a disproportionate number of Minnesotans who died in police encounters had mental illness or were experiencing a mental health crisis. The series, “A Cry for Help,” won the national Al Nakkula Award for Police Reporting. In 2018, she was named Journalist of the Year by the Minnesota chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Bjorhus was a perfectionist who was serious but also funny and wacky as she worked on painstaking, monthslong investigations, Shiffer said. In 2022, for a series called “Vanishing North” about the extinction of the state’s most vulnerable animals and plants, she drove into northern Minnesota six times in search of the elusive lynx. On another story, she and Shiffer trekked through Anoka County fields in search of bristleberry.

“She had such a command of the science and was such a good storyteller,” Shiffer said.

Friends and family said Bjorhus applied that same focus and drive to her gardens, passionate about growing native plantings. She loved cooking, being outdoors and going all out hosting dinner parties. And her style was impeccable, whether it was sporting new shoes or designing Gurnon’s bedroom and garden.

A great conversationalist and loyal friend, she delivered groceries to Gurnon when she was sick or sent songs to her sisters that she thought they’d like. She had a wry sense of humor, laughing easily, with a bellowing laugh, said her husband, Ranjit Kesha.

She was feisty, gutsy and courageous no matter what she did, he said, whether it was going up against powerful sources, driving cross-country in a beat-up Renault Le Car in her 20s or trekking to dangerous foreign countries on assignment.

“She was fearless,” Kesha said. “She had a very full life.”

Years ago, Gurnon’s daughter interviewed Bjorhus for a college assignment, asking her how she wanted to be remembered. Bjorhus had a succinct answer: “As someone who dedicated herself to journalism, and who lived and loved deeply.”

“She did change the world, and she loved her family and friends like nobody else,” Gurnon said.

Bjorhus is survived by her husband; sons Kai and Parthan; her mother, Marjorie Bjorhus of Litchfield; sisters Lori Johnson of Kimball, Minn., and Kari Bjorhus of Atlanta; and four nephews. Services will be at 1 p.m. Aug. 30 at Unity Church in St. Paul.