Sun photographer wins national award

Friday, Feb. 25, 2000 | 11:23 a.m.

Sun photographer Ethan Miller has won a national award for a photograph of the courtroom outburst of Terrell Young's mother following Young's conviction of first-degree murder in September.

Miller won the 1999 Joseph Costa Award for Courtroom Photography, which is granted annually by Ball State University in Muncie, Ind., for photos that capture the drama and emotion of courtroom proceedings.

The photo was shot minutes after Willena "Maria" Warren, who was not in the courtroom for the verdict, discovered that Young had been convicted of murder and all other charges he faced in the 1998 slayings of four young Las Vegas men in their home.

Warren asked her son's attorney, Lew Wolfbrandt, what happened, and as she was talking to the attorney, Young, who was being led out to jail, yelled, "They convicted me of all of it." Warren responded by screaming and attacking Wolfbrandt.

The winning photo of bailiffs restraining Warren ran on the front page of the Sun on Sept. 15.

The award, which has been given for the past 20 years, will be presented at Ball State's annual journalism banquet next month.

Miller, a graduate of Arizona State University, has been a photographer for the Sun since 1995. He previously worked at the Arizona Republic and the now-closed Phoenix Gazette as an intern.