Vicky Ward

Not to be confused with Vicki Ward or Victoria Ward.

Victoria Penelope Jane Ward (born 3 July 1969) is a British-born American author, investigative journalist, editor, and television commentator. She was a Senior Reporter at CNN and a former magazine and newspaper editor who has featured in The New York Times Best Seller list.

Vicky Ward
Ward in 2010
Born	Victoria Penelope Jane Ward (1969-07-03) 3 July 1969 (age 56) Chelmsford, England
Citizenship	United States
Alma mater	Trinity Hall, Cambridge (BA, MA)
Occupations	Investigative journalist author editor TV commentator
Employer	CNN
Spouse	Matthew Doull ​ ​ (m. 1995; div. 2010)​

Early life and education

Ward was born Victoria Penelope Jane Ward on 3 July 1969,^[1] the daughter of Simon Charles Ward,^[2] and Jillian Ward (née East).^[3] Ward attended Benenden School and later earned a BA and MA in English literature from Trinity Hall, Cambridge.^[4]

Journalism career

Before moving to the United States, Ward worked as a columnist and feature writer for The Independent.^[5] Ward moved to New York City in 1997, where she worked at the New York Post and was Tina Brown's editor at Talk.^[6][7] Throughout the 2000s, she wrote investigative stories for Vanity Fair on topics such as Hewlett Packard and its CEO Carly Fiorina,^[2] Kate Middleton,^[8] and a profile of Jeffrey Epstein.^[9]

Ward worked as a contributing editor to Vanity Fair as well as a columnist for the London Evening Standard. In 2010, she published her first book, The Devil's Casino, on the downfall of Lehman Brothers.^[10][11]

As a journalist, Ward has contributed to a variety of publications in the United States and the United Kingdom, such as the Financial Times, The New York Times, Esquire, the London Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Spectator, and British Vogue.^[5]

In July 2017, Ward became editor-at-large for HuffPost and Huffington Post Highline,^[12] where she wrote features on individuals including Erik Prince,^[13] Michael Cohen, Anthony Scaramucci, among others.^[14][15]

In 2019, Ward said her 2003 profile of Jeffrey Epstein in Vanity Fair had included on-the-record accounts of Annie and Maria Farmer (who filed the earliest known criminal complaints about Epstein), but that they were later stricken from Ward's article after Epstein pressured the magazine's editor Graydon Carter.^[9][16] While researching Epstein, Ward was pregnant with twins and reported that she felt compelled to hire security protection for their neonatal intensive care unit after Epstein had threatened their wellbeing.^[17][18][19] That year, Ward published Kushner, Inc., a book about Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump.^[20]

In July 2019, Ward was named Senior Reporter at CNN.^[21] Ward later became editor-at-large at Town & Country magazine.^[5] In June 2020, Ward joined the Council on Foreign Relations.^[22] In September 2023, Ward was named a Visiting Fellow at the University of Oxford.^[23]

In 2025, Ward and James Patterson published their book The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy.^[24][25] In August 2025, Ward and Patterson announced their collaboration on an upcoming book about the killing of Brian Thompson. The book is planned to be published by Little, Brown and Company. No title or release date was given.^[26]

Personal life

Ward married Matthew Doull in 1995.^[27] Ward and Doull later divorced, an experience she wrote about in the Daily Mail.^[28][29] Ward became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2017.^[4]

In 2011, a portrait of Ward, taken by photographer Jason Bell, was exhibited in the British National Portrait Gallery as part of Bell's series An Englishman in New York.^[30]

Publications

Books

• Ward, Vicky (2010). The Devil's Casino: Friendship, Betrayal and the High Stakes Games Played Inside Lehman Brothers. Wiley. ISBN 978-0-4705-4086-2.^[10][11]
• — (2014). The Liar's Ball: The Extraordinary Saga of How one Building Broke the World's Toughest Tycoons. Wiley. ISBN 978-1-1182-9531-1.^[31][32]
• — (2019). Kushner, Inc.: Greed. Ambition. Corruption. The Extraordinary Story of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-1-2501-8595-2.^[20]
• —; Patterson, James (2025). The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy. Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0-3165-7285-9.^[25]

Selected articles

• Ward, Vicky (June 2002). "The Battle For Hewlett-Packard". Vanity Fair.^[2]
• — (March 2003). "The Talented Mr. Epstein". Vanity Fair.^[9]
• — (November 2008). "Will's Cup of Tea". Vanity Fair.^[8]