Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Edwin O. Guthman, who played a key role in reporting the Watergate scandal that ended the presidency of Richard M. Nixon in the 1970s, has died at the age of 89, his family said Monday.

Guthman died Sunday at his home in Pacific Palisades near Los Angeles following a long battle with amyloidosis, a rare blood disorder, a family spokesman said.

Guthman won a Pulitzer for national reporting in 1950 for his stories in The Seattle Times on the Washington Legislature's Un-American Activities Committee.

He went on to serve as an editor with the Philadelphia Inquirer and was national editor of The Los Angeles Times from 1965 to 1977.

He was also press secretary for Attorney General and later Senator Robert F. Kennedy from 1961 to 1965.

In 1971, Guthman was listed as No. 3 on Nixon's storied "enemies list" of political opponents singled out for harassment in a memo sent from presidential aide Charles Colson to aide John Dean.

The memo described Guthman, then national editor for The Los Angeles Times, as having been "a highly sophisticated hatchetman against us in '68."

The decorated World War II veteran had taught news writing and investigative journalism at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communication since 1988 until his retirement last year.

Guthman is survived by four children and five grandchildren.

(Xinhua News Agency September 2, 2008)