 An East Timor family arrives at a makeshift morgue in Dili to recover the body of their son killed the day before in clashes between pro independence factions and paramilitary thugs. As a wire service photographer for more than 30 years, I have seen my share of death and misery. It started back in 1984 when I was assigned to help AP Photographer Lenny Ignelzi cover the funerals of the victims of the San Ysidro massacre where a lone gunman shot and killed 21 people in a McDonalds.
Watching people grieve over the loss of a loved one and then attempt to photograph that without being disrespectful to the family of the victim is done with either empathy for the people or you can just be a jerk and blast away figuring you will never see these people again so WTF. During the funerals of the Edmond, Oklahoma post office massacre I realized immediately the victims were almost family to me. Suddenly a fine line between doing my job and just walking away was drawn for me. For a long time when I had to photograph a funeral, I chose a telephoto lens and just stood back. No need to get close, just frame it up and shoot. Fast forward a couple of years, I had taken the post as the southeast Asia photo editor for the Associated Press responsible for covering such things as the independence vote in East Timor. Now I bet money that the average American can't spell East Timor much less find it on a map. But for the past 25 years (back in 1998), it has been a part of Indonesia and is not far from the island where the famous Komodo dragons live. Indonesian President B. J. Habibie had brokered a deal with the United Nations by where they would monitor the independence referendum making sure it was fair and square. Leading up to the vote there had clashes between pro-independence factions and paramilitary thugs loyal to Jakarta. Almost the entire population of East Timor came out to vote, seventy-five percent approved the measure to leave control of Indonesia who had invaded some 25 years earlier. The violence began almost immediately following the vote. I had arrived a couple of days before the vote and in my posting on East Timor 1998, I detail that. What I want to share here is a moment. It is not a pretty one though. This is the moment when this family realizes their worst nightmare has come true. Their son killed the day before in a clash between East Timor Pro Independence factions and paramilitary thugs has been placed in a makeshift morgue in Dili. This photograph haunts me to this day some 20 years later. I can not look at it and not feel sad for this family and their loss. I can not look at it and not feel anger for those that killed him. I feel certain no police came, no report was taken and then just a funeral for this young man that afternoon. I photographed that funeral as part of the ongoing news coverage of the East Timorese story. Many times I have been welcomed into a home where tragedy has struck and so, in this case, it was similar to others I had photographed. A very poor family dealing with the loss of their oldest son while outside in the capital of Dili the situation was going from bad to worse.
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