PR lessons from the plagiarism scandals rocking journalism

On Monday, Jonah Lehrer, a 31-year-old journalist and author, resigned from his job at The New Yorker for making up quotes by Bob Dylan in his best-selling book “Imagine: How Creativity Works.” Earlier, Lehrer apologized for recycling his work at other outlets for posts at The New Yorker.

Lehrer released a statement through his publisher: “The lies are over now. I understand the gravity of my position. I want to apologize to everyone I have let down, especially my editors and readers.”

Lehrer’s book has been pulled from the shelves, and media outlets who called him everything from “wunderkind writer” to “celebrated journalist” are now being forced to look inward to figure out how this happened and how to keep it from happening again.