viernes, 19 de septiembre de 2014
miércoles, 10 de septiembre de 2014
L.A. newsman José Luis Sierra dies at 56(1)
 |
| Jose Luis Sierra's family photo collage. |
Los Angeles journalist José Luis Sierra, a pioneer
in the journalism craft who promoted a brand of intelligent street-life news reporting affecting communities who mostly spoke
Spanish died last Sept.5 because of internal stomach bleeding caused by peptic
ulcers, said his brother Jorge Sierra. He was 56.
At the funeral services held at Continental Funeral
Home in East Los Angeles, Jorge said his brother began feeling sick while at
work in Spanish language MundoFox television station on Thursday, Sept. 4, and
vomited blood. He drove off to his South Pasadena home, with a crew of
co-workers closely following him. However, it was until the next day Jose Luis
decided to attend the Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena to get medical
treatment.
A surgery was scheduled, but Sierra had lost about
80% of his blood doctors deemed unsafe to proceed. “He probably bled until he
passed,” Jorge said. Peptic ulcers usually develop in the small intestine or
the stomach.
“We believe he could have survived had he received
proper treatment sooner,” Jorge said.
On Sept. 9 about 350 people attended the four-hour wake, where many praised him for his unique
style of news coverage and progressive tendency to report news often ignored by
mainstream organizations.
His colleagues and reporters said José Luis Sierra
carved a footprint in the Spanish news field in Los Angeles nobody had dared to
try. He was a charismatic and courageous newsman, who started his career with the
Pacifica Radio station as news autodidact in the early 1980s.
Sierra was born in Mexico City, but as a young child he moved to live with his grandmother in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua.
Sierra was born in Mexico City, but as a young child he moved to live with his grandmother in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua.
At 19, he migrated from Chihuahua to San Diego,
California, where he worked as horse groomer and jockey at a ranch with his
brother Jorge. Once in California, he immersed in a self-media education, which
propelled him to get gigs in local outlets in Los Angeles. His brother said José Luis had earned an
equivalent of a bachelor’s degree in engineering in México.
But his journalistic footprint began when he landed
a job as reporter for La Opinión, in the mid-1980s. He worked as the Los
Angeles City Hall news reporter.
In addition, the range of stories he covered
included articles about fatherhood, bracero-migrant protests in downtown Los
Angeles, medical negligence cases involving day-labor workers, alternative
medicine and small business startups owned by migrants, and international trade
workshops and conferences in Greater Los Angeles.
He moved on to become the assignment editor at La
Opinión, position he held into the early 2000s.
“The Spanish-speaking communities in Los Angeles are
in constant transition. For them, we are a valuable tool of information and
education, and thorough our news coverage we encourage them to improve their
levels of life,” he once said.
He migrated to Univision network, where he also
became the assignment editor at KMET Channel 34 in Los Angeles. But that gig
was short-lived.
With the arrival of Felipe Calderon to the Mexican
presidency, Sierra became a correspondent
for New American Media on the war on drugs. From the state of Chihuahua to México
City and beyond, he wrote dozens of articles that depicted the struggles of
common people affected by the violence, and fleshed out some of the outrageous
shortsightedness the Calderón regime engaged in while combating organized
crime.
All these while receiving a miserable pay.
Read Journalist, page 2.
L.A. newsman José Luis Sierra dies at 56(2)
 |
| Journalist Jose Luis Sierra. |
Journalist, page 2.
He also realized his children were growing without a
close father, and Sierra dumped the war reporting job, returned to Los Angeles,
and found a writing and editing position at MundoFox news.
His son Joshua said his father told him he wanted to
be close to them, and serve as family anchor.
“[My father] wasn’t too worried about death,” Joshua
said. Sierra told him that “when I die I want you to plant a tree with these
ashes at its foot to which you can stay close. And that’s what I’m going to
go.”
Sierra’s music tenor voice and commanding sense of
newsworthiness made up for his lack of formal university education in the
United States, a pitfall he sometimes regretted with close friends.
Nonetheless, he became a journalism instructor as
part of the University of California Los Angeles extended education program,
where he taught several beginning journalism classes.
At an eulogy, organized by his family and work
colleagues, many praised his work and the professional legacy he left behind.
“He was one who strongly believed the [man in the
street] stories provided you with the best tools to develop a good craft in
journalism,” said Eileen Truax, a former La Opinión reporter, who met Sierra as
his boss in the assignment desk . “He was a very good editor and mentor.”
Marilú Meza,
another La Opinión staff writer, said Sierra quipped “that sometimes he felt he lived with broken
wings in a four-walled room, and he needed to become involved in formal
[school] teaching. He was a good man.”
Jorge Luis
Macias, a reporter for the Spanish-weekly newspaper “Unidos,” said Sierra was a
boss, a mentor and a guide who encourage him to break from suicidal tendencies.
“He said ‘Look, don’t be an ass and quit those
thoughts.’ He wielded a rule of
order, and had a deep cultural vocation.
I hope now he’s in heaven he can write a chronicle on Juan Diego (the Mexican catholic
saint whom The Lady of Guadalupe appeared to instruct him to build a church in
her name)."
Leonardo Lorca, a program producer at KPFK 90.7 FM radio
station, said Sierra was a bohemian who delighted to hang out with Latin
American friends involved in the trade, with whom was easy to sing impromptu
songs and chat about cultural issues affecting communities in Los Angeles, and
beyond.
“We are paying homage to you, and what will endure
from you. Here we are, many of us whom met you and knew you celebrating life,
and now a departure,” Lorca said.
Gerardo López, a former editor in chief of La Opinión
and current MundoFox editor, said he encouraged
Sierra to cover the police beat with balanced accounts, because he had
become a sort of activist for the working classes who often suffered brutality,
were abused or wrongfully detained.
“ I told him to include both sides of the story, and
let the readers judge. That was our job as journalists, and still is. He was a
good crafter of the trade,” López said.
Community leaders also paid respect to Sierra’s work.
“I always saw in José Luis a comrade with lots of
respect who knew about many of our problems,” said activist Antonio Rodríguez. “But
he also proposed solutions. He always showed solidarity to us.”
As he requested, his body will be cremated, and his
ashes would be kept by Joshua, his older son. His brother Jorge said they may
also be scattered across the Copper Canyon, or Barrancas de Cobre in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, or at
Yosemite Park in California.
José Luis Sierra married twice, and is survived by his wife Loreta, his sons Joshua and Alejandro, and his daughter Loreta.
lunes, 8 de septiembre de 2014
Suscribirse a:
Entradas (Atom)
Entradas
