McCain volunteer admits faking attack report

An hour ago I saw for the first time, in the print edition of today’s New York Post, a clear photo of the young woman who told police that a black man after robbing her at an ATM in Pittsburgh had “carved” the letter “B” for Barack into her face. The story and photo persuaded me more than ever that her story was likely to be a hoax, as several VFR commenters had pointed out last night after I had posted an entry about it. I found it hard to believe that that slightly reddish backwards letter “B” had been cut into her face by a mugger. Indeed, if she was saying that this was in fact a letter “B,” when it was a backward letter “B” (strongly suggesting that she herself had scratched it on her face while looking into a mirror, without realizing how the “B” would look to others), then she was on the same level of hilarious incompetence as Virgil Starkwell in Woody Allen’s Take the Money and Run, when he tries to hold up a bank by handing the teller a note that says, “This is a hold-up. I have a gub.” The Post article also said that police were “skeptical” of the story. Then I came home, went to the New York Post webpage to link the article that I had just read in the print edition, and saw this:

POLICE: MCCAIN
VOLUNTEER ADMITS SHE
MADE UP ATTACK STORY
ORIGINALLY CLAIMED SHE WAS ATTACKED AT ATM

A new photo taken of Todd when she returned to the
police station to give more details of the “attack.”

October 24, 2008

PITTSBURGH—A McCain campaign volunteer who reported that a black man robbed her and carved a “B” into her cheek after seeing a McCain sticker on her car has admitted to making up the story, cops said.

Ashley Todd, 20, from Texas, is expected to be charged this afternoon with filing a false police report.

Cops said red flags in her story included photos and bank card information from a Pittsburgh automated teller machine where the college student claimed she was robbed on Wednesday night which did not show her using the machine.

She was given two polygraph tests.

Among the differences in her accounts are whether she lost consciousness, whether she remembers handing over money and how the man assaulted her, police said.

The report of the attack Thursday prompted the Republican presidential candidate and his running mate, Sarah Palin, to call Todd expressing their concern. Barack Obama’s campaign also issued a statement wishing Todd well and hoping the attacker would be swiftly brought to justice.

The Associated Press could not immediately locate Todd or her family.

Ethan Eilon, executive director of the College Republican National Committee, told reporters that Todd worked in New York for several months before moving to Pennsylvania two weeks ago to continue working for the group.

Eilon declined to comment on the investigation Friday or to help The Associated Press contact Todd. In a follow-up e-mail, Eilon said, “We think this girl has endured enough and that this is going to be something for her and her family to work through.”

Diane Richard, the Pittsburgh police spokeswoman, said police have pictures of the victim and her injuries, but are not releasing them. She said they are “more or less” consistent with a picture that has surfaced on the Internet that show a woman with a black eye and a red backward “B” that looks like a welt or scrape on her right cheek. “It’s not like her cheek was carved out,” Richard said. “It’s more like a scrape or a scratch.” [LA comments: This was the same contradiction, between “carved” and “scratched,” that I noted at the beginning of my previous entry on this story, though I didn’t doubt the truth of the story itself until alert commenters pointed out the problems with it.]

In her initial account, Richard said, Todd attempted to use the ATM when the man approached her from behind, put a knife with a 4- to 5-inch blade to her throat and demanded money. She told police she handed the assailant $60 and walked away.

Todd told investigators that she suspected the man then noticed a John McCain sticker on her car, became angry and punched her in the back of the head, knocking her to the ground and telling her “you are going to be a Barack supporter,” police said in a statement.

She said he continued to punch and kick her while threatening “to teach her a lesson for being a McCain supporter,” police said. She said he then sat on her chest, pinned her hands down with his knees and scratched a backward letter “B” into her face using what she believed to be a dull knife.

The woman told police she didn’t seek medical attention, but instead went to a friend’s apartment nearby and called police about 45 minutes later.

Police have reinterviewed Todd at least once since her initial statement, Richard said.

In the subsequent discussions with investigators, according to the police statement, Todd said she was accosted as she approached the bank and fled her attacker, fell to the ground and the assailant began beating and fondling her.

Police Cmdr. Larry Ross, who is in charge of the police precinct where the attack was first reported, said Todd’s story has continued to change.

“I guess she elaborated more when she went down to the bureau headquarters. She added other things to it that we didn’t have at first, that she didn’t tell the initial officer,” Ross said.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at October 24, 2008 05:15 PM | Send