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Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jim Dwyer dead at 63

NEW YORK — Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, columnist and author James “Jim” Dwyer, whose career spanned nearly 40 years, died in Manhattan on Thursday from complications of lung cancer at the age of 63.

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New York Times Executive Editor Dean Baquet and Clifford Levy, the newspaper’s metropolitan editor, confirmed Dwyer’s death in an email to staff.

“In prose that might have leapt from best-selling novels, Mr. Dwyer portrayed the last minutes of thousands who perished in the collapse of the World Trade Center’s twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001; detailed the terrors of innocent Black youths pulled over and shot by racial-profiling state troopers on the New Jersey Turnpike; and told of the coronavirus besieging a New York City hospital,” the Times reported.

In addition to the Times, Dwyer also wrote for six metropolitan dailies, including The Daily News and New York Newsday during his storied career. He won the 1995 Pulitzer for commentary and was part of the team that won the 1992 Pulitzer for spot news reporting for coverage of a subway derailment in Manhattan while working for the latter.

Dwyer also wrote or co-wrote six books, the Times reported.

Born in Manhattan on March 4, 1957, Dwyer was the second of four sons of Philip and Mary Dwyer, a public school custodian and an emergency room nurse at Bellevue Hospital, the newspaper reported.

He earned his bachelor’s degree in general science from Fordham University in 1979, and his master’s degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1980. The following year, Dwyer married Catherine Muir, a professor of computer sciences. He is survived by his wife; two daughters, Maura Dwyer and Catherine Elizabeth Dwyer; and his three brothers, Patrick, Phil and John, the Times reported.

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