Gun-Toting Journalists

Sherry Ricchiardi in American Journalism Review

"We just don't pack" guns, says Jim Cox, senior assignment editor for world news at USA Today. "If one of our reporters felt he or she was in such jeopardy that a personal weapon was required, we'd basically say, 'It's time to leave the [war] zone.'"

But what if "the zone" is the journalist's own backyard?