Los Angeles Times Names Two Managing Editors, One Associate Editor
October 11 2005 - 3:27PM
PR Newswire (US)
Masthead-level Appointments to Form Core of The Times' Leadership
Team LOS ANGELES, Oct. 11 /PRNewswire/ -- The Los Angeles Times
today announced three masthead-level appointments forming the core
of the newspaper's leadership team: Doug Frantz, investigative
reporter based in Istanbul, and Leo Wolinsky, deputy managing
editor, have been named managing editors, and Deputy Managing
Editor John Montorio was elevated to associate editor. All three
positions will report to Los Angeles Times Editor Dean Baquet. In
explaining the two managing editor positions, Baquet said, "I
wanted an aggressive way to address the issue of declining
readership, to have someone focus on it. And I wanted someone to
run the newsroom day-to-day. For a newspaper of our scope and
complexity, this would be enough work for more than one person."
Frantz will oversee The Times' major newsgathering operations,
including foreign, metro, national, Washington, business, sports,
science and obituaries. He will begin the transition to his new
position immediately and become full-time managing editor in
November. He has spent a total of nine years with The Times.
Wolinsky, who joined The Times in 1977, will continue to chair the
paper's Page One operation, and will assume responsibility for the
newspaper's efforts to attract more readers and gain circulation.
He will work with the entire Times organization to grow readership
and will also oversee newsroom resources, including staffing and
budgeting. Montorio will assume a larger leadership role at the
paper, in addition to continuing to manage The Times' features
sections. He will be responsible for a variety of special news
projects, including the encouragement of more newsmaker profiles in
the main news section and better coverage of trends throughout the
newspaper. He joined The Times in 2001. Doug Frantz, managing
editor "Throughout his career Doug has been a leader on news,
enterprise, and investigations," said Baquet. "At the Los Angeles
Times and The New York Times, he has covered some of the biggest
local, national and international stories, including the illegal
arming of Iraq, corruption in the Teamsters union, and insider
trading on Wall Street." Frantz served as city editor of the
Albuquerque (N.M.) Tribune from 1975 to 1978. He then joined the
Chicago Tribune as a metro reporter and later served as a
Washington reporter. In 1987, he joined the Los Angeles Times as a
business reporter, and eventually became an investigative reporter
in its Washington bureau. From 1994 to 2000, Frantz was an
investigative reporter for The New York Times, later becoming the
paper's investigations editor. He rejoined the Los Angeles Times in
May 2003, as an investigative reporter based in Istanbul. Frantz is
a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and was recognized for a Los
Angeles Times series chronicling the arming of Iraq before the Gulf
War, and for a New York Times series on the Church of Scientology.
His other investigative reporting honors include a 1995 and 1997
Worth Bingham Prize and a 1993 Goldsmith Prize. Frantz, with his
wife, Catherine Collins, are currently working on a biography of AQ
Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear program. They also have
co-authored "Death on the Black Sea: The Untold Story of the Struma
and World War II's Holocaust at Sea," "Celebration USA: Living in
Disney's Brave New Town," and six other nonfiction books. He earned
a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University. Leo
Wolinsky, managing editor "With Leo's appointment, we are placing
one of our most accomplished and thoughtful editors over one of our
most significant programs, one that will affect virtually every
part of the paper," said Baquet. "He -- and a soon-to-be appointed
Page One editor -- will continue to encourage the evolution of the
front page, making it livelier and harder-hitting." With The Times
since 1977, Wolinsky spent more than 12 years as a staff writer
before holding a variety of editing positions. He has served as The
Times' executive editor, managing editor of news, assistant
managing editor, metropolitan editor, city editor, California
political editor, assistant city editor and deputy Sacramento
bureau chief. Wolinsky directed the coverage of the Los Angeles
riots and the Northridge earthquake, which both won Pulitzer Prizes
for local spot news reporting. He earned a bachelor of arts degree
from the University of Southern California. John Montorio,
associate editor "John is one of the country's most accomplished
features editors. His promotion reinstates a storied title at The
Times -- one held in the past by Jim Bellows, among others. This
appointment is testament to his leadership of our features
sections," said Baquet. "But more than that, it reflects his larger
leadership role in the paper." Montorio has overseen the launch of
Home and Outdoors sections and the relaunch of Calendar, Food,
Health and, shortly, the Sunday magazine. Before he joined The
Times in August 2001, Montorio worked at The New York Times for 15
years. There, he oversaw the launch of several of the paper's
signature feature sections, including Dining, House & Home,
Sunday Styles, The City, and The Living Arts. He served as
associate managing editor, editor of the Style department, editor
of The City section, editor of the Weekend section, editor of The
Living Arts, assistant editor of the Sunday business section, and
deputy editor of the Home section. He also was executive editor of
The Newsday Magazine from 1983 to 1988 and editor of The Washington
Star's Sunday Magazine from 1977 to 1981. Montorio earned a
bachelor of arts degree, cum laude, from Seton Hall University and
a master's degree from the University of Virginia. The Los Angeles
Times, a Tribune Publishing company, is the largest metropolitan
daily newspaper in the country and the winner of 37 Pulitzer
Prizes, including two this year. The Times publishes five daily
regional editions, for the Los Angeles metropolitan area, Orange
County, Ventura County, the San Fernando Valley, and the Inland
Empire of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, as well as a
National edition. Additional information about The Times is
available at http://www.latimes.com/mediacenter. DATASOURCE: Los
Angeles Times CONTACT: Martha Goldstein of Los Angeles Times,
+1-213-237-3727, Web site: http://www.latimes.com/mediacenter
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