Pulitzer Prize winner promotes media convergence

Seattle Times staff used e-mail, Facebook and Twitter to exchange information and keep readers informed during 60 straight hours of reporting on the shooting deaths of four police officers last fall.

Staff members used cell phones to send text messages, photos and videos to the newsroom for print and online editions.

Joe Ruiz, associate producer for news at SeattleTimes.com, said news staffers worked continuously during the hunt for the suspect.

"We spent all day getting news tips, writing up whatever we could," he said. "We had someone doing online for at least 60 hours during that time."

That coverage led to the Times' news team winning the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News reporting.

Ruiz described media convergence, which incorporates a variety of technology into news reporting, during the 33rd Edith Fox King Journalism Lecture sponsored by the journalism program in the department of media communications at this college. The student chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists co-sponsored the event.

About 25 students, faculty and staff gathered in Longwith Radio, Television and Film Building to hear Ruiz outline the various ways the Seattle Times communicated to the public during the manhunt for the suspect.

"One sergeant and three officers were killed in the shooting," Ruiz said. "Nine children lost their parents. If there's anything that makes me still emotional about shootings like this, it's when it involves children."

After a two-day manhunt, the suspect was shot and killed by police.

"When word got out that it was possibly Maurice Clemmons, our reporters did their research and realized that he had been in prison in Arkansas in the late '90s," Ruiz said.

Clemmons had served 11 years of a 108-year sentence for eight felony convictions including robbery and burglary.

Then-Gov. Mike Huckabee granted him clemency, making Clemmons eligible for parole. Huckabee was a candidate in the 2008 U.S. Republican primary.

The Pulitzer committee commended the newspaper staff for the speed and accuracy of its comprehensive coverage during a breaking news story.

Ruiz, who had started working at the Seattle Times shortly before the shootings, said his primary job is coding copy, editing video and keeping the SeattleTimes.com site updated.

He got his start in journalism after a knee injury while playing middle school football.

"To stay close to sports, I joined the middle school paper," he said.

Ruiz wrote free-lance articles for the San Antonio Express-News and spent two years as the news editor for KSAT-TV's Web site before joining the Seattle Times. He was a participant in the 1997 Urban Journalism Workshop at this college before attending Texas State University-San Marcos.

For more information, visit http://www.pulitzer.org/citation/2010-Breaking-News-Reporting or www.seattletimes.com.