Pulitzer-Winning Reporter Gene Miller Dies

The preceding was an example of Mr. Miller's style, known as the "Miller chop" -- a short sentence after a couple of long ones.

It is rare, though not unprecedented, to win two Pulitzer Prizes for reporting. Mr. Miller went on to edit two more Pulitzer winners: Edna Buchanan's police beat reporting entry in 1986 and Sydney Freedberg's look into a local cult in 1991. Mr. Miller called himself a "peripheral contributor" to two more Pulitzers that the Herald won, in 1993 and in 1999. He won a Neiman Fellowship at Harvard University in 1967 and wrote two books, both born of his newspaper reporting.

Mr. Miller, who was born in Evansville, Ind., graduated from Indiana University in 1950. He spent two years in the Army in the Counter Intelligence Corps, where he said he remarked "on surveillance, forgot where parked car."

He claimed to have been fired from the Wall Street Journal, where he spent a year in 1953, for lack of respect for the price of crude cottonseed oil. He worked at the News Leader in Richmond for three years, leaving after editors failed to see the newsworthiness of an article about a motorist who, having failed to pay the nickel toll on a bridge, was shot at by the tollbooth guard. The publisher and his neighbors owned the bridge, Mr. Miller said.

He found a journalistic home in Miami, where stories about wacky criminals, cruise-ship fires, kidnappings, dangerous doctors and race riots formed the warp and woof of a reporter's life. In such circumstances, some reporters wear out and others become adrenaline junkies. Mr. Miller burrowed more deeply into the injustices turned up by such daily journalism. Even after he mostly retired his reporter's notebook, he read every word in each day's paper.

His wife of 41 years, Electra Yphantis Miller, died in 1993.

Survivors include his wife of seven years, Caroline Heck; four children from his first marriage; a stepson; and eight grandchildren.

In his last story, he noted that he was treated in 2000 for a malignant tumor "with predicted 5 percent chance of future problems. Ha! In lieu of flowers, have a martini. Try Boodles gin. Parting words: Great run! Much joy! For sexual escapades, see addenda."