IN- Girl facing criminal charges for lying about abduction attempt

10-4-2009 Indiana:

A 12-year-old girl told police, family and friends a man tried to abduct her, but investigators say she made it all up. Now she's in big trouble.

LaPorte Police Capt. Clyde Crass said the girl's story about how the abduction took place didn't add up for her mother. The mother talked to her daughter after school Friday and the girl confessed she made it all up so she wouldn't get in trouble for being in a neighborhood where she wasn't supposed to be.

WSBT talked to the girl's grandmother Friday afternoon before the lie was uncovered. The grandmother explained she reluctantly gave her granddaughter permission to ride her bike to a friend's house Thursday afternoon.

According to the police report, the girl got lost and a man stopped and asked her if she was cold. When she said yes, he asked if she wanted to go back to his house and warm up in his bed.

The girl then told investigators the man grabbed her off her bike. He then took off when she started screaming.

She ran to a friend's house to call 911.

“I was devastated, it was frightening,” said the girl's grandmother, Christina McPherson, before she found out about the lie. “I've read about it before but I guess I never dreamed it would happen to my granddaughter, never at all. And I do hope they catch him.”

As a result of the girl's police report, a second mother called detectives and told them her daughter and a friend had a similar encounter Wednesday afternoon.

The LaPorte Police Department was taking the attempted abduction allegations so seriously it put two detectives on the case.

Crass said the department is taking the 12-year-old's lie just as seriously because it tied up valuable resources at a time when budgets are tight and they are very busy investigating legitimate cases.

The girl will likely be charged with a class B misdemeanor for “false reporting,” or lying to police.

Detectives are still looking into a separate allegation of an attempted abduction. That mother came forward to police when the 12-year-old's story first came out. Police think two little girls may have been approached by a man Wednesday afternoon. ..Source.. by WSBT-TV Report