As part of his work for the Alicia Patterson Foundation, Waas published a 7,912 word article in the "Los Angeles Times" on April 3, 1994, detailing how mentally retarded children institutionalized by the District of Columbia government had died because of abuse and neglect. The story led to renewed scrutiny by the U.S. Department of Justice of the city's treatment of its mentally retarded wards and spurred on the settlement of a civil suit brought against the city government by the parents of children who had died due to abuse or neglect.