Trailblazing and Award-Winning Broadcaster Dies at 90

Legendary Los Angeles broadcaster Warren Wilson, who was awarded both an Emmy and a Peabody Award during his career spanning more than 40 years, died on Friday at the age of 90, his son Stanley Wilson said in a statement. “His demeanor on the air as an iconic television journalist was just as authentic as he was a father, unsensational, sincere, a voice calming and eloquent,” Stanley Wilson wrote. Wilson was a trailblazer as one of the first Black broadcasters in Los Angeles when he started in the 1960s. He covered the 1965 and 1992 Los Angeles riots against police brutality, the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, the Charles Manson case and the O.J. Simpson trial. He won a 1979 Emmy Award for his investigative journalism and a Peabody Award for his riot coverage. After his retirement, Wilson reflected on his career with the Los Angeles Times: “I have done everything I’ve set out to do, despite the obstacles that were in my way from the beginning.”