Jonathan Dienst is NBC New York’s Chief Investigative Reporter and Chief Justice Contributor for NBC News.  Dienst’s reporting is featured on WNBC newscasts and digital properties. Dienst also regularly appears on NBC national programs including NBC Nightly News, MSNBC, NBC News Now, and The Today Show.  He also appears on Dateline and CNBC, and he regularly contributes to NBCNews.com.

Dienst helps lead WNBC and NBC News coverage of major breaking news ranging from terrorism to public corruption, white collar crime to mass shootings. His reporting has included: coverage of former President Trump’s alleged abuses; alleged wrongdoing by Sen. Robert Menendez, Sen. Robert Torricelli, former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former NYPD Commissioner Bernie Kerik, former NY Governors Cuomo, Spitzer, Paterson, NY Senate leader Joe Bruno, NY Assembly Speaker Silver, former Westchester DA Jeanine Pirro, among other federal, state and local officials. He also played an important role in WNBC’s coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, the large-scale protests following the murder of George Floyd and the impact of those protests across the region. 

Dienst joined NBC shortly after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.  For more than 20 years, he has helped spearhead the network’s coverage of significant terror-related incidents at home and abroad. Dienst also covers the NYPD and major crime stories from coast to coast – from school shootings in Newtown and Uvalde, to significant organized crime cases and to corruption on Wall Street.

Prior to joining NBC, Dienst worked as a reporter for WPIX-TV in New York from 1996-2001 and was one the original reporters who helped launch NY 1 News in 1992.  He covered the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, the mass shooting on the LIRR later that same year, and the 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800.  His first on-air position was with WSAV in Savannah, GA where he helped cover that city’s skyrocketing crime rate and local police corruption.  Dienst also had experience working behind the scenes at Fox 5 New York, and has written articles for the NY Times, Newsday and the NY Post.  Dienst’s exclusive reporting has received recognition and awards including:  Associated Press, Emmy, Murrow, Columbia-DuPont, NY Press Club, Investigative Reporters and Editors, among others. 

Dienst is a graduate of Colgate University and received his MS in Journalism from Columbia University.