Shaun D. Mullen, age 72, passed away on December 12, 2019.

Committal Services with Military Honors will be 11 am on Thursday, February 20, 2020 at the Delaware Veterans Memorial Cemetery, 2465 Chesapeake City Rd, Bear, DE 19701.



Following is an article written by Brandon Holveck that was published in the News Journal about Mr. Mullen.


https://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/2020/01/27/shaun-mullen-former-news-journal-and-philadelphia-daily-news-journalist-remembered/4562395002/


Shaun Mullen, a former News Journal reporter and editor, dedicated himself to holding those in power accountable and offering a nuanced perspective.

In a career spanning three decades, including two stints with The News Journal and a 20-year run at the Philadelphia Daily News, he earned the admiration and respect of his peers while covering some of the country's most impactful events, including the Bill Clinton impeachment trial and 12 presidential campaigns.

Mullen died Dec. 12 at age 72 at his East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania home. A service will be held for Mullen at the Delaware Veterans Cemetery on Feb. 20 at 11 a.m. A reception will follow at the Blue Crab Grill on Elkton Road in Newark.

Colleagues remember Mullen as an editor who stayed calm under pressure, serving as a motivating force at all hours. Gene Seymour, a former Daily News staff writer, reflected on his time working with Mullen in a Facebook post, describing the atmosphere in the newsroom in the aftermath of the 1985 Philadelphia police bombing of a MOVE compound.

Seymour said anytime Mullen was in the newsroom he knew "everything's gone be all right."

"Nothing seemed to faze him or harsh his mellow, even at those moments when the urgency of an event mandated greater focus," Seymour wrote. "He led us through such times more by example than by assertion."

Born in Wilmington in 1947, Mullen and his siblings grew up in a political household, his sister Deb Shane said. A graduate of John Dickinson High School, Mullen almost immediately parlayed his passion for politics to a pursuit for a career in news. He served as editor of the high school paper and the university's student newspaper The Review.

"He's very clearly a brilliant man and knew his course early in life and followed it," Shane said.

The News Journal hired Mullen as a reporter after he left UD, but he was soon drafted into the Army. Mullen was sent to Tokyo, Japan, to work on the Pacific Stars and Stripes newspaper during the Vietnam War. He returned to The News Journal as an editor in 1973.

The Philadelphia Daily News hired Mullen as its night city editor in 1981. He later worked as a special projects editor, an editorial writer and a reporter. In addition to his work in politics, Mullen was involved in coverage of the O.J. Simpson murder trial and the rise of Osama bin Laden. He received five Pulitzer Prize nominations in his career.

"These weren't just the stories of a guy who did a good job," Shane said. "These were stories that rocked our country."

After retiring from the Daily News, Mullen returned to Delaware to work with the University of Delaware's library's special collections. There he applied his reporting skills to a variety of local historical projects.

"Part of my work is local history, and the best of that is getting to know people who know history — and that was Shaun," said Rebecca Johnson Melvin, the library's manuscripts librarian. "He devoured all of our collection descriptions and shared a lot of great stories."

Today the library maintains an archive of his work, beginning with his time at The Review in 1968.

In retirement, he also wrote a politics blog called Kiko's House and contributed to The Moderate Voice, a weblog offering "irreverent comments, and serious analysis of events, issues and people in the news."

On his blog, Mullen shared perspective on current events as well as stories about his love of music and the passing of friends. Increasingly, his topic of choice became the Russia scandal and the progress being made toward the impeachment of President Donald Trump.

His self-written profile reads, "Shaun Mullen was born to blog. It just took a few years for the medium to catch up to the messenger."

"Mr. Mullen possessed a disciplined outrage at injustice and corruption, which he wedded to a level-headed deep dive into factual detail to offer a nuanced and powerful perspective for his readers," said Hugh Cutler, a friend and Mullen's colleague at The News Journal.

Mullen also published two books: "The Bottom of the Fox: A True Story of Love, Devotion & Cold-Blooded Murder" (2010), and "There's A House In The Land: A Tale of the 1970s" (2014).

Mullen is survived by his longtime partner, Deborah Jan Olson, a son, a daughter, a brother, a sister and three grandchildren.