Here is what we have found on your question.
As you've described, there really are several different aspects of this situation. It has seemed to me that there are two main points though.
1.) Misattribution of a published work -- this could serve to damage the integrity of the author of the original work, harm his/her reputation, and violates the "moral rights" of authors as outlined in the Berne Convention (of which the U.S. is ostensibly a signatory).
2.) Resume fraud - the person doing the deliberate misquoting is misrepresenting their qualifications and possibly harming a potential employer. You seem to be more interested in the misquoted author as the wronged party, so I didn't investigate this issue to any great extent. I did, though, get a useful citation to a law review article from another librarian should you wish to investigate this further: Huynh, Hoang. "The Downfall of Grease Hazard Technicians and Products Delivery Specialists or 'Why French Fry Cooks and Pizza Delivery Guys Should Not Pad Their Resumes': Scrutinizing Crawford Rehabilitation Services, Inc. v. Weissman." BYU Journal of Public Law, 1999. 14 BYU J. Pub. L. 103.
Your analogy of identity theft was useful -- maybe even more than you anticipated, since it seems that both of these issues are not very clearly defined in terms of legal remedies in the U. S. right now. We are only just recently legally recognizing the victims of identity theft as true victims in these cases -- in addition to the merchants or credit companies who are being directly defrauded.
Similarly, the "moral rights" of authors (which are different than copyright which is seen as an economic and property issue and has a long and sturdy legal history behind it) are rather sketchily dealt with in the U.S. code and case law -- at least, insofar as I was able to determine.
I found an excellent overview of "moral rights" in an article in Information Today here.
Included among the moral rights of authors as outlined in the Berne Convention is "the right to object to any mutilation or deformation or other modification of, or other derogatory action in relation to, the work which would be prejudicial to the author’s honor or reputation" (see the Berne Convention U.S. Code 17 U.S.C.106A does indeed refer to just visual arts --- sorry, that was an oversight on my part. The article in Information Today does not describe a similar section for authors of written works, nor was I able to find one, but rather the article suggests that there is a patchwork of state laws, case laws, and Constitutional provisions that are understood to guarantee those rights. It's a subject of some discussion, obviously.
The most relevant area I was able to identify in the California Civil codes, were sections 980-989), but I found nothing there that clearly protected an author from false attribution.
We did identify one Supreme Court case relating to false attribution that is possibly relevant, Masson v. New Yorker Magazine, Inc. (89-1799), 501 U.S. 496 (1991). You may review the opinion here here.
So the upshot seems to be that the author may indeed have a grievance related to the damage to his/her reputation, but the avenues for redress is not terribly clear. The victims of fraud in this cause would seem to be more accurately described as the potential employer.
