Covering the Sting Operation behind 'American Hustle'

Many films carry the vague message, "based on a true story." A new film carries the equally vague but tantalizing, "some of this actually happened." American Hustle features an FBI operation with a fictitious Arab sheikh and a con man who persuades public officials to take bribes. Anybody who's read a review of the film knows that. But, did the FBI really conduct an operation like that? The answer is yes in what came to be called "Abscam" after a reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer broke the story. She is Jan Schaffer now in Washington with the Institute for Interactive Journalism at American University.