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Chapter 1 of the story of Robert Ramos, Life and Death of a Journalist...continued.

(part 8)

© 2005, Mark Murphy
Not to be reproduced or resold without the express written permission of New England Press.
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I might have told him to watch his back very carefully. Here in the U.S., journalists don't generally get killed for their work. Although it has happened, it is difficult for most to remember the Karen Silkwood incident from 1978, which involved an investigative reporter who was killed when she found out a little too much about the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant, while it was still under construction. But that would have been miniature in comparison to what happens to journalists in the Philippines. The only equivalent in the U.S. is when reporters try to cover the Mob. Then is when the reporter's life is indisputably in danger. The other situation is covering the Iraq war; journalists are getting killed or kidnapped in substantial numbers. There are enough hazards covering news stories that can cause a reporter's death. We might have told Robby not to fall into predictable habits. We would have told him to watch his back all the time, and to be suspicious of strangers. We would have told him that to do anything else would be to invite death to his front door. We would have told him to rotate out of the stories he was covering...so that no one would be able to track him easily enough to shoot him.

His take on the situation was understandable enough...he had a family that could just as easily become the target of those who wanted him dead, but would have instead settled for some family members. Better from his perspective to keep everyone in the dark about it. He might have known better than all of us what the risks were; he had some people who could have briefed him very well about it. Which brings us to our maddening conclusion: How could he have been killed the way he was? Did someone just get lucky? Did he get sloppy with his own safety, and make a fatal mistake by returning to the spot where he burned the owners? How long had he been tailed...if indeed he was tailed? The modus operandi seems to be the same; multiple persons travel on scooter, get to within range, then go for the kill. They aren't always successful; sometimes the reporter escapes unscathed. Some of them wear the battle scars for life. Then, there are the reporters who don't make it out alive...

(more to come...)