L.A. Times readers want to know why Betty Ford’s death didn’t get the front-page treatment Amy Winehouse’s did

On Sunday, the Los Angeles Times--like plenty of other newspapers--ran an obituary for Amy Winehouse, the drug-addled neo-soul singer who was found dead at the age of 27 in her London apartment the day before, on its front cover.

This didn't well with one reader, who noticed the paper didn't give Betty Ford's obituary the same A1 treatment.

"OK, let me get this straight," Colleen Bennett wrote in a letter to the Times' editor. "The L.A. Times didn't think the death of Betty Ford, former first lady and substance abuse treatment icon, deserved a front page obituary. But Amy Winehouse, a flash-in-the-pan singer who didn't see the need to recover from said substance abuse, does?"

Deirdre Edgar, the paper's "reader representative," posed that question to Times assistant managing editor Joe Eckdahl, who said that both were worthy of front-page treatment, but print deadlines came into play.

"On many days, production concerns and press capacity issues require us to close the front page," Eckdahl said. "The news of Ford's passing came late on a Friday. We held the A1 presses long enough to ensure readers were informed of her death with a sizable photograph and an index item telling folks they could turn to LATExtra to read the full obituary."

Winehouse's death was reported before noon Saturday, "leaving plenty of time to be considered for Sunday's front page."

[H/T: FishbowlLA]

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