Cops: McCain Worker Made Up Attack Story
Pittsburgh Woman To Be Charged With Making False Report After Claiming "B" Was Carved Into Face By Mugger
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Ashley Todd (AP/sarahsarmy.blogspot.com)
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Ashley Todd, 20-year-old college student from College Station, Texas, admitted Friday that the story was false, police said.
Maurita Bryant, the assistant chief of the police department's investigations division, said Todd is being charged with making a false police report.
Police doubted her story from the start, Bryant said.
"She just opened up and said she wanted to tell the truth," Bryant said, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. "She was upset with the media for blowing this into a political firestorm."
Todd, who is white, initially told police she was attacked by a 6-foot-4 black man Wednesday night.
She told investigators she was attempting to use a bank branch 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 said she handed the assailant $60 and walked away.
Todd claimed that she suspected the man then noticed a 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.
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 with a dull knife.
Todd also told police she didn't seek medical attention, but instead went to a friend's apartment nearby and called police about 45 minutes later.
On Friday, when she admitted the story was fabricated, Todd told police she believes she cut the backward "B" onto her own cheek, but she didn't explain how or why, Bryant said.
"She said she doesn't remember doing it but knows it must have been her who did it," Bryant said, according to the Tribune-Review.
Todd reportedly said she thought of Barack Obama when she saw the "B" on her cheek and minutes later "came up what a plan" to manufacture the story, according to Bryant.
She now tells investigators she was neither robbed nor attacked.
"We had some serious cases going on, and this wasted so much time," Bryant said. "Our detectives have been working through the night just to verify the information we suspected was false from the beginning."
Bryant said somebody charged with making a false report would typically be cited and sent a summons. But because police have concerns about Todd's mental health, they are consulting with the Allegheny County District Attorney. She remained in custody and was awaiting arraignment.
Todd worked in New York for the College Republican National Committee before moving two weeks ago to Pennsylvania, where her duties included recruiting college students, the committee's executive director, Ethan Eilon, has said.
Eilon declined to comment on the investigation Friday or to help The Associated Press contact Todd.
Police investigating the alleged attack quickly noticed some inconsistencies in Todd's story and administered a polygraph test, CBS station KDKA reports.
Authorities declined to release the results of that test, but investigators said they received photos from the ATM machine and "the photographs were verified as not being the victim making the transaction."
Police say they do not believe any other people were involved. They said Todd's friends believed the story about the attack.
Police suspected all along that Todd might not be telling the truth, starting with the fact that the "B" was backward, Bryant said.
"We have robbers here in Pittsburgh, but they don't generally mutilate someone's face like that," Bryant said. "They just take the money and run."
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See all 809 CommentsI concur. Ashley the criminal lying racist, is McCain%u2019s last moniker.
The article and much, much, more can be found on the Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
It turned out that she was a fraud, see: http://kdka.com/local/attack.McCain.Bloomfield.2.847628.html
Well, we should cut her some slack since ''Joe the plumber'' was not quite Joe, not a licensed plumber but an Ohio tax dodger and a registered republican.
It turned out that she was a fraud, see: http://kdka.com/local/attack.McCain.Bloomfield.2.847628.html
Well, we should cut her some slack since ''Joe the plumber'' was not quite Joe, not a licensed plumber but an Ohio tax dodger and a registered republican.
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Posted by dhutch88 at 03:11 PM : Oct 24, 2008
So tell me, oh great one bring up blacks on welfare, which race has more people on public assistance?
*****
Both McCain and Palin called this young lady on the phone
This is why Palin should have put a stop to the hate occurring at her rallies during the last few weeks. Instead Palin fanned the flames.
OMG too funny.
0/23/jmoody_1023/
I concur. Ashley the criminal lying racist, is McCain''s final moniker.
The article and much, much, more can be found on the Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
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Posted by whosaid1 at 03:14 PM : Oct 24, 2008
You don''t think it''s a reflection of race relations in this country that she lied and said a black man did it, 1 in 3 people know a person who say they will not vote for Barack because he''s black and the comments about him being a Muslim or Rev Wright? Sorry, but that IS news and maybe, just maybe some of the people trying to bring the 1950''s back will remember you should judge a person by WHO THEY ARE and not by their skin color. You need to look inside and see why you hate minorities so much.
Posted by dhutch88
Here we go again, another GOP member that can''t write an intelligent post so the reversion to name calling and pounding sand. If you don''t like CBS Liberal spin take your comments to WTOP. They''ll love you there, but your just a plant on this blog anyway. Have a nice life in your hate-em all world.
Posted by doorgunner2 at 03:16 PM : Oct 24, 2008
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That is heck a funny! Let''s hope that this time Ashley doesn''t get it @ss backwards and inverted!
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Posted by patrik1974 at 03:15 PM : Oct 24, 2008
Ha, not if the very person she''s trying to help gets elected. I think their motto is "Tough ***; I got mine".
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Who''''s "Bob"?
Posted by doorgunner2 at 03:19 PM
http://think.mtv.com/044FDFFFF01911965001700994703/
We all know why she made up the story... to scare the elderly white population that blacks (and Obama supporters by inference) are going to rob, and sexually abuse, and terrorize your daughters, sisters and friends. This is a throw back to the days of slavery and the KKK. Pure and simple racial intimidation. They should not only charge this girl with making a false police report, but with racial intimidation crimes as well. I hope all of the networks that covered the report originally give this news equal coverage.
He said he was a "Bob" supporter.
Who''''s "Bob"?
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Posted by doorgunner2 at 03:19 PM : Oct 24, 2008
What about Bob....
This woman represents the depravity of the McLame campaign!
The point everybody is trying to make is that there are people out there like this young lady who will believe what you tell them, we are not equals in IQ level or mental capacity but elected leaders especially know better.
The point is and I do not believe McCain and Palin are racists but they are hoping to win Ohio/Pennsylvania/Florida because they know that is where race is a factor and they are appealing to underlying psyche of these indvisuals
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Posted by ritewingman at 03:21 PM : Oct 24, 2008
BS, back up one story that you know of that has not been covered by the media? You need to pull the Rush radio out of your a@@.
*****
Your logic is flawed -- you want to believe that all Obama''s former preacher did for 20 years is scream about the white man?
Does it not seem rather interesting that John McCain and Palin both personally called to talk to her? Not their campaign manager, nor the local lead representative but the two GOP bigwigs?
To me that seems they wanted to use this attack as some sort of launch pad to get traction with their floundering campaign.
Good enough for me.
McCain 08....Vote or die!
Posted by ritewingman at 03:21 PM : Oct 24, 2008
Do you have ANY evidence of any worker for Obama doing anything like this or is this just MORE of you and your neocon Hate anyone who doesn''t agree with the "Party" trash?
Of course this is the hate that the Republicans have spread.
One other thing I am sending money to the Democrats to make certain that they remove the ilk Repulbicans for the senate. I am sick and tired of them and there stall tactics. It is time to move America forward.
It is going to be a blood bath for the Repulbicans in this election and they know it.
I appreciate your sympathetic statement, but this isn''t instability, its racism. Other posters have brought up Crystal Mangum - that incident was racism too, but it was really only a con-job to try to get some money - dispicable, but not on the scale of what this woman did, which was try to influence the outcome of a national election.
Many republicans on THIS BOARD are beating themselves up as well, in the form of making false and ludicrous claims in order to "promote" their candidate. By Nov. 5, McCain himself will have to disavow the likes of Ashley Todd and many of the "republicans" on THIS SITE. You guys ought to cool the nasty rhetoric -- it is not funny and doesn''''t win votes.
This woman represents the depravity of the McSame campaign!
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