Jayson Blair - Plagiarism and Fabrication Scandal

Plagiarism and Fabrication Scandal

On April 28, 2003, Blair received a call from Times national editor Jim Roberts asking him about similarities between a story he had written two days earlier and one written by San Antonio Express-News reporter Macarena Hernandez on April 18. Hernandez had a summer internship at The Times years earlier and had worked alongside Blair. The senior editor of the San Antonio Express-News contacted The Times about close similarities between Blair's article and a story penned by his reporter, Hernandez.

The resulting inquiry led to the discovery of fabrication and plagiarism in a number of articles Blair had written. Some untruths include Blair's claims to have traveled from New York to the city mentioned in the byline, when he did not.

Some of the suspect articles include the following:

• In the October 30, 2002, piece "US Sniper Case Seen as a Barrier to a Confession," Blair wrote that a dispute between police authorities had ruined the interrogation of suspect John Muhammad and that Muhammad was about to confess, quoting unnamed officials. This was swiftly denied by everyone involved. Blair also named certain lawyers, who were not present, as having witnessed the interrogation.
• In the February 10, 2003, piece "Peace and Answers Eluding Victims of the Sniper Attacks," Blair claimed to be in Washington, plagiarized quotations from a Washington Post story, and fabricated quotations from a person he had not interviewed. Blair ascribed a wide range of facts to a man featured in the article, almost all of which the man in question denied. Blair also published information that he had promised was off the record.

• In the March 3, 2003, piece "Making Sniper Suspect Talk Puts Detective in Spotlight," Blair claimed to be in Fairfax, Virginia. He described a videotape of Lee Malvo, the younger defendant in the case, being questioned by police and quoted officials' review of the tape. No such tape existed. Blair also claimed a detective noticed blood on a man's jeans leading to a confession, which did not occur.

• In the March 27, 2003, piece "Relatives of Missing Soldiers Dread Hearing Worse News," Blair again pretended to be in West Virginia and plagiarized quotations from an Associated Press article. He claimed to have spoken to one relative who had no recollection of meeting Blair, said "tobacco fields and cattle pastures" were visible from Lynch's parents' house when they were not, erroneously stated that Lynch's brother was in the National Guard, misspelled Lynch's mother's name, and fabricated a dream that he claimed she had had.

• In the April 3, 2003, piece "Rescue in Iraq and a ‘Big Stir' in West Virginia," Blair claimed to have covered the Jessica Lynch story from her home town of Palestine, West Virginia. Blair never traveled to Palestine, and his entire contribution to the story consisted of rearranged details from Associated Press stories.
• In the April 7, 2003, piece "For One Pastor, the War Hits Home," Blair wrote of a church service in Cleveland and an interview with the minister. Blair never went to Cleveland; he only spoke to the minister on the phone and then copied most of the article from an earlier Washington Post article. He also plagiarized quotations from The Plain Dealer and New York Daily News. He fabricated a detail about the minister's keeping a picture of his son inside his Bible and got the name of the church wrong.
• In the April 19, 2003, piece "In Military Wards, Questions and Fears From the Wounded," Blair described interviewing four injured soldiers in a naval hospital. He never went to the hospital and only spoke to one soldier on the phone, to whom he later attributed made-up quotes. Blair wrote that the soldier "will most likely limp the rest of his life and need to use a cane," which was untrue. He said another soldier had lost his right leg when it had only been amputated below the knee. He described two soldiers as being in the hospital at the same time when in fact they were admitted five days apart.

The Times reported on Blair's journalistic misdeeds in an unprecedented 7,239-word front-page story on May 11, 2003, headlined "Times Reporter Who Resigned Leaves Long Trail of Deception." The story called the affair "a low point in the 152-year history of the newspaper." On the NPR radio show "Talk of the Nation", Blair explained that his fabrications started with what he thought was a relatively innocent infraction: using a quote from a press conference which he had missed. He described a gradual process whereby his ethical violations became worse and contended that his main motivation was a fear of not living up to the expectations that he and others had for his career.