San Francisco Peninsula Press Club: Pattern seen in killings of ethnic reporters

Since 1976, 11 of the 13 journalists slain in the United States in apparent retaliation for their reporting worked for the ethnic press, the Chron reports today, citing the Committee to Protect Journalists. Among those killed were three Bay Area Journalists:

Oakland Post editor Chauncey Bailey (pictured), who was gunned down last August as he was investigating infighting at Your Black Muslim Bakery. A member of the bakery is charged in his death.

Lam Trong Duong, a contributor to a Vietnamese newsletter supportive of the communist government of Vietnam, was shot in 1981 near his apartment Tenderloin apartment, and

Henry Liu, author of a Chinese-language book accusing Taiwanese officials of corruption, was killed in 1984 in his Daly City home by hit men hired by the Taiwanese government.

The common thread? "In 10 incidents, the reporters who were killed covered minority or immigrant communities for publications that tended to have an intense, intimate relationship with readers. Often they were the only ones writing about issues that the mainstream press failed to cover," writes Chron reporter Matthai Kuruvila.