Alfonso Chardy, whose methodical reporting ushered The Miami Herald to a Pulitzer Prize for exposing the Iran-contra scandal in 1986 and contributed to three other Pulitzers that the newspaper won, died on April 9 in a Miami hospital. The cause was a heart attack, said his wife, Siobhan T. Morrisey. Mr. Chardy was instrumental in uncovering a link between the illegal sale of weapons to Iran orchestrated by senior Reagan administration officials to facilitate the release of Western hostages, and the covert diversion of proceeds from that sale to support right-wing rebels in Nicaragua known as the contras. The Westerners were being held in Lebanon by the Iranian-supported militant group Hezbollah. In Nicaragua, the contras were battling the leftist Sandinista government.

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Persons: Alfonso Chardy, Siobhan T, Chardy, Reagan, Oliver L Organizations: Miami Herald, Sandinista Locations: Iran, Miami, Nicaragua, Lebanon, Iranian