Three Cups of Tea co-author David Oliver Relin, 49, commits suicide following questions over authenticity of book

David Oliver Relin, the co-author of the best-selling novel Three Cups of Tea, has committed suicide at age 49, a year after the details of the book were called into question.

Relin killed himself in the Portland-area town of Corbett, Oregon on November 14 and died of a blunt force head injury, medical examiners said. They declined to provide any further details.

His family said the author and humanitarian joualist 'suffered from depression' and that a police statement providing more information would be released this week.

Relin, who was married, co-wrote Three Cups of Tea with Greg Mortenson, and suffered emotionally and financially after readers and critics doubted facts in the book.

The book, which was published in 2006, was conceived as a way to raise money and tell the story of the Central Asia Institute, which Mortenson co-founded in 1996 to build schools.

But among the alleged fabrications was that some of the schools Mortenson's charity, the Central Asia Institute, claimed it had set up either did not exist or were built by other charities.

Also noted was Mortenson's account that he stumbled lost and dehydrated into the village of Korphe in Pakistan after trying to climb a mountain, and decided to build a school there after the residents saved him.

His previous writings had made no mention of his being lost or wandering into Korphe, and he also previously indicated that he originally planned to build the first school in another village.

There were also claims that his charity had mismanaged funds and that a chunk of money had been used to promote the book, rather than support his schools.

Scrutiny: The book follows the adventures of co-author Greg Mortenson, pictured in Wakhan, northeaste Afghanistan in 2009, as he set up schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan

In April, a judge rejected a lawsuit by four people who bought the book, who claimed the authors, the publisher, and the charity had conspired to make Mortenson into a false hero to sell books.

U.S. District Judge Sam Haddon called the claims overly broad, flimsy and speculative.

Mortenson had denied any wrongdoing, though he has acknowledged some details in the book were wrong. He agreed to repay the charity more than $1 million in travel and 'personal charges'.

Relin did not speak publicly about the charges, but he hired a lawyer to defend himself in the lawsuit.

The legal wranglings came after Relin, who was bo in Rochester, had enjoyed a stellar career as a humanitarian joualist committed to telling stories about young people in need.

He also reported from East Asia, and spent two years writing about Vietnam's growing educational and financial stability after he spent a year traveling through the country on bicycle in 1992.

'Dishonest': But critics claimed some parts of the book had been fabricated and Mortenson, left, later admitted some facts were wrong. Relin suffered emotionally and financially in the aftermath

According to one online biography, he won more than 40 national awards for his work.

'He felt his causes passionately,' Lee Kravitz, the former editor of Parade who hired Relin for various publications throughout the 1990s, told the New York Times.

'He especially cared about young people. I always assigned him to stories that would inspire people to take action to improve their lives.'

He leaves behind his wife, Dawn, his mother, his stepfather and two sisters.

He had also completed a new book, which will be published in the spring, about two doctors working to cure cataract-related blindness in the developing world, the Times reported.