Friday, October 24, 2008

Update 1: RECANTED -- McCain Volunteer Says Knife Attack Did Not Happen

Pittsburgh Police confirm to WTAE Channel 4 Action News Reporter Paul Van Osdol: Ashley Todd now tells investigators she made up the story. She will be charged with filing a false report.


UPDATE 1: Here's the Pittsburgh Police news release:

OFFICE OF THE CHIEF
1203 Western Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15223

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: CONTACT: PIO Diane Richard
October 24, 2008

UPDATED INFORMATION
WOMAN ROBBED AND ASSAULTED IN BLOOMFIELD

PITTSBURGH - On Friday, October 24th, 2008 Ashley Todd was asked to return to the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police Headquarters to be re-interviewed and do a composite sketch. During the subsequent interview with Detectives, Ms. Todd stated "she just wanted to tell the truth."

At that time Ms. Todd stated that she made up the story which snowballed and got out of control. Ms. Todd stated that she was not robbed and there is no 6'4" black male attacker.

She indicated that she has had a prior mental problems and she does not remember how the backward letter "B" got on her face. She stated that she thinks she may have done it herself because she was the only one in the car.

When she looked in the rearview mirror and saw the "B" on her face she said she thought of Barrack. Once she told her friend the story and once the police were called she had to stick with it.

Todd will be arrested and charged with Filing a False Police Report (M3).
We are conferring with the Allegheny County DA office on what charges will placed against her.

Meanwhile, here are the police news releases from earlier today. Click to enlarge them.





8 comments:

Anonymous said...

call me rude for not commenting on the actual story, but man, they should have had a proofreader skim through that press release before sending it out to the general public...

Anonymous said...

lifeinthefield.com has pulled her blog entries. It looks like the site is run by the College Republican National Committee. You can still view the cached version. http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:ZRQVtES3pF8J:lifeinthefield.com/blogs/ashley-todd+Ashley+Todd&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&gl=us

Anonymous said...

This only goes to show how divided this election is making us. In order to save face, the Republicans will label her as a fringe fanatic and the Democrats will point to her and say, "I told you so." In reality, this is what the current polarizing views of political parties are creating in their bases by launching vicious attacks and lies.
Does anyone else smell Rome burning?

Anonymous said...

Sounds like something my ex would do. She was psycho too.

Anonymous said...

Our next president's first name is spelled "Barack." Six letters, very easy to spell.

Sad that a McCain-Palin supporter felt the need to slander Senator Obama, black people, and the good city of Pittsburgh, and make light of the crime that real does occur and everyday attacks on women all over the globe, just because she craved attention and was so full of hate, but this is the kind of thing the McCain-Palin has been fomenting for weeks now. People screaming anti-Muslim and anti-Arab statements, calling for attacks on Senator Obama, death threats to election officials and ACORN workers, and slaughtered animals left on university roundabouts with Obama signs taped to the carcass's head are all indications that these people are full of misplaced rage and hate.

Perhaps when Todd, like other McCain-Palin supporters looks in the mirror again, she will look inside herself and ask why she would ever have done such a despicable, heinous, slanderous thing. As a high-level right-wing McCain-Palin supporter at Fox News, John Moody, said, it is, nevertheless, a death knell for the McCain-Palin campaign.

megpeg said...

I do not believe it but I should by now. The first five comments are like all the others I have encounter lately. They are not commenting on the story at hand but their on agenda. So I will be the first to comment so they will know how to do it the next time.

In a way you could be furios with this young lady for what she did. Causing all this chaos and bring this to the national spotlight.
Yet, you must feel empathic for her. She has told the truth about herself and a condition that can not be explained as to how people are afflicted with it. She did admit to police that she has had a mental condition. It is scary to think that this woman can do harm to herself and carry out this kind of stunt and see nothing wrong in it. All she was hunting for was attention. She does not deserve a cell but an inpatient stay where she can get help on her condition so she does not hurt herself anymore or cause even worse wild goose chases like this. Don't be mad at her, be empathic. She would not fully understand your anger.
megpeg

Anonymous said...

I stumbled upon her MYSPACE.com
account tonight... and it is striking that this doesn't seem at all like a mental illness and more like a childish game of "look at me" her headline on myspace is "Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her cloths off, but its better if you do."
< LINK: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=8513159 >

It disturbs me that someone who is supposedly an adult can do something like this... and more over that when some says, "awe shucks I don't know what happened, wait there was this one time i thought i was mentally ill, hey if i tell them i did it maybe they just send me back to texas", we let it go...

I am shocked that the Pittsburgh Police aren't taking more action... and I am disgusted that someone could just so randomly blame an "invisible man" of an assault and burn up the national media the way this did...

Bram Reichbaum said...

"The victim later said the actor called her a lot of names and stated that 'You are going to be a Barrack supporter'..."

This is comedy, pure and simple. I think both sides of the partisan divide are processing this pretty efficiently. I do worry a little about the ripple effects of Blue smugness, but frankly I worry more about Red copycats. And I think the police bureau did great work with those releases, given it was breaking information.

They sure got the message across: This lady ain't tellin' the truth. I can't believe she decided to try to beat the polygraph!