Plain Dealer wins Dart Award for “Johanna: Facing Forward”

The Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma is

a global network of journalists, journalism educators and health professionals dedicated to improving media coverage of trauma, conflict and tragedy. The Center also addresses the consequences of such coverage for those working in journalism.

The Dart Awards for Excellence in Coverage of Trauma

recognize exemplary journalism on the impact of violence, crime, disaster and other traumatic events on individuals, families or communities. Entries should focus on the experience of victims and survivors, and contribute to public understanding of trauma-related issues.

The Dart Awards recognize newspaper and radio journalism that goes beyond the ordinary in reporting on trauma. The newspaper category, which includes online journalism, has two sub-categories: spot news, and in-depth reporting….

This year, the Plain Dealer’s nine-part series about the beyond violent assault of an 18 year old girl by her 17 year old ex-boyfriend (you can read it here) won top honors. Here’s the Dart description of the series:

An 18-year-old girl named Johanna Orozco became a news story when her younger ex-boyfriend put a sawed-off shotgun to her jaw and pulled the trigger. But instead of ending her story, that shooting was only the beginning. Over the six months that followed, Johanna let Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter Rachel Dissell and photographer Gus Chan into her life to tell the in-depth story both of a relationship’s turn to obsession and abuse, and of a strong young woman’s recovery. Nine front-page stories, along with online media available at cleveland.com/johanna, inspired dozens of teens and adults in abusive relationships to correspond with Johanna, and her story was used by the Domestic Violence Center in Cleveland to encourage other Latinas to raise their voices and get out of violent relationships.

The Dart Center explains more about the win here:

The Cleveland Plain Dealer received the Dart Award for “Johanna: Facing Forward” (Rachel Dissell, reporter; Gus Chan, photographer). This remarkable nine-day series traced events leading to the 2007 shooting of 18-year-old Johanna Orozco by her 17-year-old boyfriend. Exploring the roots of relationship violence through Johanna’s eyes, the series – reported and photographed over six months - particularly struck a chord in Cleveland’s Latino community and led to the creation of abuse-awareness programs for teens.

Judges singled out “Johanna: Facing Forward” for its extraordinarily compelling and careful explanation of a teenager’s harrowing experience. They described it as a tour-de-force of narrative writing and photography and called the series poignant, complex and intimate. They commended Dissell and Chan for the compassion, dignity and cultural acuity used in reporting Johanna’s story.

On April 23, next Wednesday, the PD will receive the award at a ceremony and participate in a panel hosted by Columbia’s J-school in NYC called, “Panel on Covering Victims of Violence, Crime and Trauma.”

Congratulations to the PD. Sadly, there are far too many stories that fit the categories covered by the Dart, but at least the work of covering them is recognized.

Sphere: Related Content

By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:18 am April 14th, 2008 in Women, Social Issues, Law, Ohio, Culture, Cleveland+, Media, Announcements, Education

Comments

One Response to “Plain Dealer wins Dart Award for “Johanna: Facing Forward””

1 Coverage of county foster children: loss of McCafferty, improved SACWIS | Writes Like She Talks on July 10th, 2008 12:32 pm

[…] at The Plain Dealer, profiled three foster kids. Dissell excels at this type of coverage (having won awards for her work covering Johanna […]

Leave a Reply