Washington Post sweeps Pulitzer Prizes for reporting

Apr 7, 2008, 21:42 GMT

New York - The Washington Post won a list of prizes for its distinguished journalism including national and international reporting and feature writing, Columbia University's Pulitzer Prize board said Monday.

The Post won the prizes for public service and breaking news reporting. Its reporters Jo Becker and Barton Gellman won the prize for national reporting and Steve Fainaru for international reporting.

Fainaru won the prize for his 'heavily reported series on private security contractors in Iraq that operate outside most of the laws governing American forces.'

The board said the Post won the prize on breaking news reporting for 'its exceptional, multi-faceted coverage of the deadly shooting rampage at Virginia Tech, telling the developing story in print and online.'

The Post's Gene Weingarten won the Pulitzer for feature writing, and Steve Pearlstein won the prize for commentary.

Weingarten won the prize for his 'chronicling of a world-class violinist who, as an experiment, played beautiful music in a subway station filled with unheeding commuters.'

The New York Times' Walt Bogdanich and Jake Hooker and The Chicago Tribune staff were each awarded prizes for investigative reporting.

The prize on investigative reporting to The Times reporters was for their stories on toxic ingredients in medicine and other everyday products imported from China, leading to crackdown by US and Chinese officials.

The Chicago Tribune won the prize for exposing 'faulty governmental regulations of toys, car seats and cribs, resulting in the extensive recall of hazardous products and congressional action to righten supervision.'

The Pulitzer Prize Board said that the public service prize was given for a 'distinguished example of meritorious public service by a newspaper through the use of journalistic resources.'

'Awarded to the Washington Post for the work of Dana Priest, Anne Hull and photographer Michel du Cille in exposing mistreatment of wounded veterans at Walter Reed Hospital, evoking a national outcry and producing reforms by federal officials.'

The Post's Steven Pearlstein won the prize on commentary for his 'insightful columns that explore the nation's complex economic ills with masterful clarity.'

The New York Times' Amy Harmon won the prize in explanatory reporting for her 'striking examination of the dilemmas and ethical issues that accompany DNA testing, using human stories to sharpen her reports.'

Reuters' Andrees Latif won the prize for breaking news photography for his dramatic photograph of a Japanese videographer, 'sprawled in the pavement, fatally wounded during a street demonstration in Myanmar.'

The prize for feature photography was won by Preston Gannaway of the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire for her 'intimae chronicle of a family coping with a parent's terminal illness.'

Other top prizes included the prize on general fiction, which went to Saul Friedlander for The Years of extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945, published by HarperCollins.

The prize in music went to US composer David Lang for The Little Match Girl Passion, which was commissioned by the Carnegie Hall Corporation and premiered in October 2007.

A special citation was given to folk music icon Bob Dylan for his 'profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical composition of extraordinary poetic power.'

The list of Pulitzer winners was the 92nd annual prizes in journalism, letters, drama and music awarded by the Pulitzer Prize board.