Columnist Out After Fake Quotes, Sources

An awarding-winning columnist for the Boston Globe resigned after being asked to leave by the paper’s editor, who said the columnist admitted to fabricating people and quotes in four columns this year. Patricia Smith, 42, who is also a poet, did not return phone calls. In a column in today’s Globe, Smith apologizes to her readers, to the paper, and to her late father, whom she credits as an inspiration to her journalism career. “From time to time in my metro column, to create the desired impact or slam home a salient point, I attributed quotes to people who didn’t exist,” she wrote.