Lynn Marie Steely VonDemfange, a writer, editor and artist, committed suicide on Feb. 3 of an intentional drug overdose. She was 39. VonDemfange edited Kansas City Home Design magazine and Country Home magazine, and penned a column for Kansas City magazine and The Lovely County Citizen. She also wrote a copy of her self-penned obituary before she took her own life.

Samuel J. Boyle, a veteran journalist who spent two decades as the chief of The Associated Press' New York City bureau, died on Feb. 3 of lung cancer. He was 59. Boyle coordinated thousands of stories at the AP, including the Bernard Goetz subway shootings, the rise and fall of mobster John Gotti, City Hall under mayors Ed Koch, David Dinkins and Rudolph Giuliani, the crash of TWA Flight 800 and the World Trade Center attacks in 1993 and 2001. After retiring in 2004, Boyle taught fundamental writing and reporting at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and worked as an editor for the Columbia News Service.