Trinidad National Leads Team To Pulitzer Prize Win

Davan Maharaj, editor-in-chief and publisher of the Los Angeles Times Media Group.

By NAN Contributor

News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Weds. April 20, 2016: A Trinidad-born national at the largest daily news gathering organization in the Western U.S. is celebrating along with his team the highest prize in journalism – a Pulitzer Prize win.

Davan Maharaj, editor-in-chief and publisher of the Los Angeles Times Media Group, praised his staff Tuesday as the Pulitzer Prize win for the LA Times was announced.

The Los Angeles Times staff won for “Breaking News Reporting” for their coverage of the San Bernardino terrorist attack. Maharaj said his team’s work epitomized how news should be covered in the  digital age, with staffers providing tweets, breaking news alerts, great pictures, videos, and “everything in between.”

“We owned the story,” he was quoted by the LA Times as saying. L.A. Times Metro desk’s Sarah Parvini also worked extensively on the story.

Maharaj was appointed to the post in March 2016 after 40 staff members were previously let go during a buyout. He is a 26-year veteran of The Times and had previously been named editor and executive vice president from 2011.

Maharaj began at The Times as a summer intern in 1989 and worked as a reporter in Orange County, Los Angeles and East Africa. His six-part series “Living on Pennies,” in collaboration with Times photographer Francine Orr, won the 2005 Ernie Pyle Award for Human Interest Writing and inspired readers to donate tens of thousands of dollars to aid agencies working in Africa. Closer to home, Maharaj’s investigative report about a Leisure World attorney who inherited millions of dollars in stock, land and other “gifts” from his clients led to changes in California probate law.

Maharaj has been an assistant foreign editor and, in Business, served as a deputy editor before assuming leadership of the department. During Maharaj’s tenure, the Business section revamped its coverage to give greater emphasis to consumer issues. It also redesigned its Sunday section to focus on personal finances.

Maharaj holds a political science degree from the University of Tennessee and a master’s degree in law from Yale University.

The Times Media Group includes the flagship Los Angeles Times and latimes.com; Times Community News, which consists of six suburban daily and weekly newspapers and websites; and the Spanish-language Hoy and Fin de Semana newspapers and websites. As the single largest property in the Tribune Publishing Co., The Times is responsible for providing the foreign, national and Washington, D.C., reports for seven other newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune, and their websites.

The Poynter Institute reports that the Pulitzer committee received 1,112 submissions in the various journalism categories.

Other 2016 Pulitzer winners are:

Public Service – The Associated Press

National Reporting – Staff, The Washington Post

Local Reporting – Michael LaForgia, Cara Fitzpatrick and Lisa Gartner – The Tampa Bay Times

Breaking News Photography – Mauricio Lima, Sergey Ponomarev, Tyler Hicks and Daniel Etter – The New York Times

Feature Photography – Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe

Feature Writing – Kathryn Schulz, The New Yorker

Criticism – Emily Nussbaum, The New Yorker

Commentary – Farah Stockman, The Boston Globe

Editorial Writing – ​John Hackworth, Sun Newspapers, Charlotte Harbor, Fla.

International Reporting – Alissa J. Rubin, The New York Times

​Investigative Reporting – Leonora LaPeter Anton, Anthony Cormier and Michael Braga Ms. Anton and Mr. Cormier of The Tampa Bay Times; Mr. Braga of The Sarasota Herald-Tribune