Los Angeles Times Announces New Editor

Los Angeles Times

A Tribune Publishing Company



Los Angeles Times Announces New Editor

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 7, 2006 – The Los Angeles Times announced today that James E. O'Shea, managing editor of the Chicago Tribune, will become executive vice president and editor, effective Nov. 13. He succeeds Dean Baquet, who will be leaving the newspaper Friday.

"Jim is a journalist's journalist, and a tough-minded but fair, independent thinker, of rock hard news values and integrity, professional and personal," said David D. Hiller, Los Angeles Times publisher. "Jim understands the imperatives of sustaining readership. At the Chicago Tribune, he's led its efforts to re-invent how the newsroom operates in the new 24/7 multi-channel environment. He will not miss a beat in leading similar efforts here at The Times."

"I want to thank Dean for all of his contributions and leadership during the past six years," said Hiller. "He is a great editor and journalist. But, after considerable discussion during the past several weeks, Dean and I concluded that we have significant differences on the future direction of The Times."

James E. O'Shea

From 1995 until being named managing editor in 2001, O’Shea was deputy managing editor for news. Prior to this assignment supervising the Tribune’s news divisions, O’Shea was the newspaper’s associate managing editor for foreign and national news.

A veteran of the Tribune’s news staff, O’Shea has covered local, business, national and foreign news for the Tribune in a variety of assignments. He joined the Tribune staff in 1979 after working as a reporter, editor and Washington correspondent for the Des Moines Register. He won numerous journalism awards and is the author of two books, "The Daisy Chain," a book about the savings and loan crisis and "Dangerous Company," an investigative profile of management consultants, and the role they play in corporate decision making.

As a member of the Tribune's Washington bureau, O'Shea won the Sigma Delta Chi National Distinguished Service award for Washington Correspondence twice between 1985 and 1988. His coverage of the savings and loan crisis for the Tribune won the Associated Press Managing Editor's Public Service Award in 1989 and the Tribune's William Jones Award for investigative reporting. A 1987 series he wrote on U.S. military and technological aid to Israel won honorable mention in the Raymond Clapper Award by the White House Correspondents' Association, and he is a two-time winner of the Peter Lisagor Award given by the Chicago chapter of Sigma Delta Chi.

Prior to his editing assignment, O'Shea covered national budget policy and economics in the Tribune's Washington bureau from 1982 to 1984. He was named national security correspondent that year and covered the Pentagon until 1988. He was named senior economics correspondent in the Tribune's Washington Bureau in February 1988. O'Shea joined the Washington bureau after working in Chicago for three years on various investigative projects for the Tribune's Financial News Desk.

While in Chicago, O'Shea won several awards, including the National Education Writers Award for his coverage of the collapse of the city's school finance system. He was the financial editor at the Des Moines Register from 1973 to 1976, and was a member of the Register's Washington bureau from 1976 to 1979, when he joined the Tribune.

A graduate of the University of Missouri, O'Shea holds an undergraduate degree in English and philosophy and a master's degree in journalism. He got his start in journalism while in the U.S. Army. O’Shea worked as an army journalist covering the U.S. troops stationed in the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.

Born in East St. Louis, Illinois, O'Shea grew up in St. Louis, Missouri.

About the Los Angeles Times

The Pulitzer Prize-winning Los Angeles Times is the largest metropolitan daily newspaper in the country, with a daily readership of nearly 2.2 million and about 3.3 million on Sunday. The Los Angeles Times and its media businesses and affiliates – including latimes.com, The Envelope (TheEnvelope.com), Times Community Newspapers, Recycler Classifieds, Hoy, and California Community News – are read by approximately 8 million or 62% of all adults in the Southern California marketplace every week.

The Los Angeles Times, which this year marks its 125th anniversary covering Southern California, is part of Tribune Company (NYSE: TRB), one of the country's leading media companies with businesses in publishing, the Internet and broadcasting. Additional information about the Los Angeles Times is available at www.latimes.com/mediacenter.
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