Jayson Blair
Jayson Blair is a former reporter for The New York Times. He was asked to resign in 2003 because of plagiarized writing and unethical journalistic standards.
Fast Facts
- Born: March 23, 1976
- Birth place: Columbia, Maryland
- Attended: Jerry Falwell's Liberty University and the University of Maryland
- Did not graduate from either school
- Published more than 725 articles1
- Admitted to drug addiction1
- Problems found in 36 of 73 articles reviewed2
Scandal at the Times
Blair worked alongside reporter Macarena Hernandez years before she accused him of plagiarizing her work. After Hernandez found blatant similarities between an article Blair wrote for the Times on April 26, 2003, and a story she had written for the San Antonio Express-News, she contacted editors in New York.
The New York Times conducted a thorough investigation of Blair's articles and found several instances of plagiarism in pieces written in late 2002 and early 2003. After Blair resigned, the Times blamed management failures for Blair's ease of promotion through the newspaper's hierarchy. The affirmative action policy at the Times was also questioned, as Blair is an African-American.3
Burning Down My Master's House
In Blair's 2004 memoir, he admits including fictional details in news stories he wrote for the paper.1 In the book, he maintains that he was a victim of sexual abuse while a child. The book also discusses his alcoholism and cocaine abuse.4
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