1999 George Polk Award Winners at a Glance

Foreign Reporting--Paul Watson, Los Angeles Times, for his searing first-hand accounts of the war in Kosovo made possible by his ingenuity, persistence and courage in resisting expulsion. Watson unearthed atrocities committed by both sides.

Television Foreign Reporting--Giselle Portenier, Olenka Frenkiel and Fiona Murch, BBC News, for "Murder in Purdah," a shocking report shown on Nightline on the murder of women in Pakistan by husbands, fathers and brothers in the name of "honour."

International Reporting--Sang-hun Choe, Charles J. Hanley, Martha Mendoza and Randy Herschaft, Associated Press, for doggedly compiling evidence confirming that American soldiers massacred hundreds of South Korean civilians at No Gun Ri during the first weeks of the Korean War.

National Reporting--Jason DeParle, The New York Times, for an analysis of welfare reform in Wisconsin that peeled away layers of self-congratulation to uncover surprising results about how little the better numbers translated into improving life for former recipients.

Regional Reporting--Todd Richissin and Andre Chung, The Baltimore Sun, for exposing inhumane treatment of children sentenced to three Maryland boot camps for juvenile delinquents.

Criminal Justice Reporting--Ken Armstrong and Steve Mills, Chicago Tribune, for an investigation revealing that Illinois sent at least 12 innocent men to death row. Their stories led the governor to impose a moratorium on capital punishment in the state.

Local Reporting--Kevin Carmody, Daily Southtown (Illinois), for revealing how hundreds of scientists and workers were kept in the dark for 45 years about the potentially deadly health consequences of their exposure to the toxic metal beryllium in atom bomb factories.

Local Television Reporting--The "I" Team, WWOR-TV, for the culmination of a decade-long series of more than 100 reports that documented New Jersey's widespread practice of "racial profiling," the singling out of minority targets by police.

Editorial Writing--Daily News (New York), for "New York's Harvest of Shame," a 14-part series of editorials that brought to light legally sanctioned exploitation of New York's farm workers and led to legislative reform.

Financial Reporting--Ellen E. Schultz, The Wall Street Journal, for her series that explained how several of the largest corporations in America cut the retirement benefits of millions of employees, without their knowledge, by adopting "cash-balance" pension plans.

Medical Reporting--Andrea Gerlin, The Philadelphia Inquirer, for a four-part series that documented how medical mistakes made in U.S. hospitals kill thousands of patients each year.

Special Award--National Security Archive, for serving as an essential journalistic resource and for expanding access to previously classified documents, ranging from Henry Kissinger's transcripts with Mao to the Guatemalan death squad dossier.

Career Award--Studs Terkel, who has captured the voices of ordinary Americans for half a century on his Chicago radio program and in his epic oral history books about the Depression, the Second World War, working, the arts, race relations and aging.