The Right Hand Man: A Journey of Investigation in Panama with Cillian Dunne

Then-27-year old Cillian Dunne tells the story of choosing to follow a piece of reporting in a Central American nation, beyond the page and into lived experience. That choice took him to Panama, where he arrived young, unfamiliar with the language, and committed to a project whose shape was still unclear. What began as research became daily life when he found himself living alongside a man who had once operated at the center of power during one of the region’s most contentious, yet secretive eras: the 1980s under dictator Manuel Noriega.

The focus is not on politics or policy, but on pursuit of a story. What it means to enter a place as an outsider and stay. How access is earned through time rather than leverage. How trust forms slowly and can fracture without warning. Dunne describes the realities of working in unfamiliar neighborhoods, missing cues, misreading situations, and learning when listening mattered more than speaking.

Historical context appears only as needed. It supports the narrative rather than driving it. At its core, the talk is about commitment, patience, and the quiet pressure of staying put when leaving would be easier. It is about what happens when a writer follows a story into places where he does not belong and accepts the consequences of seeing it through.


Cillian Dunne is an Irish American investigative writer and the author of six books, split between fiction and nonfiction. He reports from high risk environments and works directly with high risk subjects, including intelligence figures, incarcerated individuals, and people tied to organized crime, political violence, and espionage. He is the author of Stayaway Hideaway (2019), Death by a Million Papercuts (2022), Dreams in Incarceration (2023), True West (2023), Wild Atlantic (2025), and The Right Hand Man (2025), spanning investigative nonfiction, narrative nonfiction, and literary fiction built on firsthand research and long term fieldwork in the United States, Ireland, and Latin America. He has also worked within the prison system as a mitigation strategist and prison consultant, partnering with defendants, families, and legal teams on high stakes federal cases. His writing has appeared in major newspapers, his work on incarceration has been taught in university classrooms at San Francisco State University, and he continues to write about prisons, political power, and espionage from the ground level.

This program was organized by Phoebe Piper #1244.