LA Times Editor Forced to Resign

Los Angeles Times Editor Dean Baquet listens to a question after addressing the Associated Press Managing Editors conference in New Orleans in a Thursday Oct. 26,2006 file photo. Baquet is leaving the paper just weeks after the paper's publisher, Jeff Johnson, was forced to resign following a dispute with the paper's parent, Tribune Co., over cost cuts. Baquet confirmed his departure in an e-mail to his staff minutes after the news broke in the Wall Street Journal online and on a local Web site. (AP Photo/Bill Haber, File) (Bill Haber - AP)

LOS ANGELES -- The future of the Los Angles Times has become even more muddied after editor Dean Baquet, who had defied Times' parent Tribune Co. on slashing newsroom jobs, was forced to resign.

The paper's staff was already facing the possibility that it could be sold as part of a plan by Chicago-based Tribune to please angry shareholders by selling all or part of the company.

Tribune has said it will decide by the end of the year on a plan that could include a breakup of the media company. Billionaire Ron Burkle, business leader Eli Broad and Hollywood mogul David Geffen have voiced interest in buying the Los Angeles Times, but no formal offer is said to have been made.

Now the paper is facing almost certain budget cuts, although publisher David Hiller said Tuesday no cuts will be made this year.

Baquet's resignation Tuesday comes just a month after former publisher Jeff Johnson also was forced to step down. In a rare public display of defiance, the two news executives had refused to agree to further budget cuts at the Times.

That stand was backed by Times employees, who have rallied behind Baquet. A number of high profile community leaders also wrote Tribune in September urging a halt to cuts at the Times.

"It's a loss, losing someone as talented as Dean" David Fleming, past chairman of the Los Angeles Economic Development Commission said Tuesday. Fleming was one of the signers of the September letter.

"Newspapers are going through a hellacious time right now. The only way they can fight it is to cut costs, but that's not good for readers."

Baquet will be replaced Monday by James O'Shea, the managing editor of the Chicago Tribune, the newspaper said. O'Shea will be reunited with Hiller, who took over for Johnson after serving as publisher at the Tribune.

Hiller met with Baquet's top deputies Tuesday and urged them to stay. At least one, managing editor Douglas Frantz, told colleagues in an e-mail he would not leave the paper.

"So while I'm angry and heartbroken, I'm not quitting," Frantz wrote. "And I'm asking all of you not to quit, not literally or figuratively."

Hiller told the Times staff Tuesday that Baquet's departure came after the two could not agree about the future of the paper.