Thompson was a staff reporter for '' The Intercept '' , but was fired in February 2016 for fabricating quotes and attributions in news articles . This included a false claim , purportedly made by a cousin of Dylann Roof , that Roof was motivated to commit the Charleston church shooting because a former love interest chose black men over Roof . A note from editor Betsy Reed indicated that Thompson had been fired recently after his editors discovered " a pattern of deception " in his reporting . According to Reed , he had " fabricated several quotes in his stories and created fake email accounts that he used to impersonate people , one of which was a Gmail account in my name "
Charleston church shooting
Charleston church shooting
Juan M. Thompson