Dith Pran was a photojournalist in Cambodia during the Cambodian Revolution. He worked with a British film crew as a translator, and spent time with New York Times reporter, Sydney Schanberg ( Pulitzer Prize winner, 1976). He was forced to stay behind in Cambodia when the Khmer Rouge took over the country. He endured four years of torture and starvation before the Vietnam over throw the Khmer Rouge.
When he walked 40-miles  he saw all the skeletal remains of the victims, coining the term, "Killing Fields". He was able to escape to Thailand, where he and Schanberg had a heartfelt reunion before going to the United States where he worked as a photojournalist for the New York Times. 
In 1984, the movie, "The Killing Fields" showed his story from when Schanberg arrived in Cambodia to October  1979, the day he and Scanberg reunited. He became a U.S citizen a few years later, organizing the The Dith Pran Holocaust Awareness Project. He died in 2008 of pancreatic cancer.