Newspaper Photographer Resigns Over Digitally Altered Front-Page Picture

TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) _ A staff photographer for The Blade who digitally altered a front-page photo has resigned, the newspaper said Monday. <br/><br/>Allan Detrich had told Blade editors that he altered a

Monday, April 9th 2007, 5:08 pm

By: News On 6

TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) _ A staff photographer for The Blade who digitally altered a front-page photo has resigned, the newspaper said Monday.

Allan Detrich had told Blade editors that he altered a photo of a college baseball team for his personal files and mistakenly sent it to the newspaper.

The photo showed Bluffton University players kneeling March 30 at their first game after a bus crash killed five players in Atlanta. Photos of the team in other Ohio newspapers showed the legs of someone standing in the background, but the legs did not appear in The Blade photo even though it was taken from a similar angle.

Detrich resigned Saturday, a day after he was suspended, Blade spokeswoman Luann Sharp said.

Detrich, who started with the Blade in 1989, said he is starting a new business and had been planning to leave the newspaper.

``I'm going to enjoy my life with my family,'' he said Monday. ``I'll be glad I'm out of the news business.''

He also has worked for The Advertiser-Tribune in Tiffin and The Xenia Daily Gazette. He was a Pulitzer finalist in feature photography in 1998 for a series of photos of children who fled abusive parents.

The Blade is reviewing other Detrich photos it has published to see if any others were altered, Sharp said.

The Associated Press has removed access to 50 Detrich images that were in its photo archive.

The Blade, owned by Block Communications Inc., has a circulation of 135,000 on weekdays and 180,000 on Sundays.