Pulitzer Prize winner discusses ethical issues in “Enrique’s Journey”

Sonia Nazario, who won this year’s Pulitzer Prize in feature writing, discusses ethical issues involved in reporting the story “Enrique’s Journey” in an interview posted on the Society of Professional Journalists Greater Los Angeles chapter’s Web site, http://spj.org/losangeles/nazario.html.

Nazario, who also won the Polk Award for the six-part series, describes the journey through Mexico that an estimated 48,000 Central American children take each year to search for their mothers in the United States. Don Bartletti, the photographer for the series, also won a Pulitzer Prize.

The interview is framed in the tenets of SPJ’s Code of Ethics: seek truth and report it, minimize harm, act independently, and be accountable. Among the issues Nazario discusses in the interview are:
--using anonymous sources;

--working with at-risk sources, that is, children who are jumping onto moving trains, encountering bandits and rapists, and drinking tainted water; and

--allowing these children put themselves at risk rather than offering to help them.

The interview was in conjunction with a public program with Nazario hosted by LA chapter that was funded through a SPJ grant.