LA Times staff writer Christopher Goffard has a new, notable badge of honor. He is the first reporter to see his article efforts spun off as an officially sanctioned e-book.

Available for 99 cents, A Nightmare Made Real expands the portrayal of various characters and the remarks of Louis Gonzalez III, a Las Vegas banker accused of a vicious 2008 assault on his ex-girlfriend. The child custody battle gone horribly wrong was initially reported by Goffard as a two-part series in June:

“E-books offer an exciting opportunity to take the Times‘ world-class journalism and present it as a different reading experience,” Times editor Russ Stanton said. “We’re excited to release titles that span our areas of expertise and can be easily and conveniently accessed.”

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The Society for Features Journalism announced the winners of its annual “Excellence-in-Features Writing Competition” today, and the LA Times did quite well for itself. Charles McNulty took first prize for “General Commentary” while his colleague David L. Ulin took honorable mention. Other nods from the Times: Catharine Hamm‘s travel section won third place for “Reader Engagement;” Christopher Goffard took third prize in the “General Feature” category; and the Booster Shots health blog and Daily Dish both earned distinctions in “Blogging.” Roger Ebert, incidentally, took home first prize in that category for his work on the Chicago Sun-Times website.

Full list of winners at Romenesko.