Sandy West, Dead at 47

FBLA wonders if there’s a ranking in the obits section of the LA Times. We ask because today’s coverage is misguided, to say the least.

Today, the lead obituary is of San Francisco-based cartoonist Miriam Engelbaum who died at 48 of breast cancer. Jocelyn Stewart tells her story pretty plainly, but effectively. Smiling through tears, etc.

But–buried, and no pun intended, is a wire-service story of the death of rock goddess, Sandy West, drummer for The Runaways. She died in a hospice in San Dimas, after fighting cancer for a year. She founded the band with Joan Jett when she was 16.

Didn’t anyone at the LA Times know she was sick? Her fans did. Aren’t newspapers supposed to prepare these things in advance? West died on Saturday, Oct. 21–isn’t that enough lead time?

Please let us believe that a big feature story on her is in the works and that the AP story is just a space-filler. No disrespect to Engelbaum, but West deserves better from her–here we go again–home-town paper.

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