A woman in California has been exposed after faking her own kidnapping, assault, and robbery as part of a scheme to get out of paying subcontractors $9,000. The police of Fresno, California, are currently seeking the capture of 32-year-old Maria Gonzalez, who is part owner of family business M & C Gonzalez Trucking. They initially encountered her at a house in Fresno early this month, where she was bound and gagged, having sustained a head injury. Gonzalez claimed she had been forcibly abducted with a weapon, violated, and stripped of the money she was going to use to pay her contractors.
Woman fakes her own kidnapping and robbery to avoid paying employees, police say https://t.co/9iW5dZ2FS1 pic.twitter.com/j8CKQekMgA
— World News Tonight (@ABCWorldNews) September 4, 2018
Police report that Gonzalez wept profusely as she recounted the story of her kidnapping. She said that she had stopped her vehicle for dogs in the road when two “masked black men” approached the car and opened her door. She claimed that one of them tied her arms, jammed a rag in her mouth, and told her to drive, all while pressing a weapon to her temple. She says she had no recollection of the drive after that, and that her next memory was waking up in a strange house to find her wallet gone, head bludgeoned, and “moisture in (her) underwear.”
She reportedly claimed she lost consciousness and woke up in a home with her hands tied and a rag in her mouth https://t.co/COKcVVjQVg
— New York Post (@nypost) September 5, 2018
But the more police questioned Gonzalez on the details of her story, the more things didn’t add up. She claims they took her money, yet she had other valuable items in her purse at the time, such as her smart phone and jewelry. In addition, only one set of footprints was found near her vehicle. Her memory was also very spotty, as police report that she was unable to provide additional facts when pressed. It all came to a head when police showed her a comprehensive, high-definition video of the area in which the supposed kidnapping happened. She was simply unable to point to specifics, and finally admitted that she’d invented the story so she could avoid paying her subcontractors. She admitted that she had been the one to tie her hands up with a phone cord, and had faked her injuries with makeup.
“The reality is she did not have the $9,000 to pay the subcontractors and that’s why she made up the story,” said Fresno Police Chief Jerry Dyer.
When Fresno’s local ABC affiliate tried to get in touch with Gonzalez, she would not emerge from her home. Her grandfather claimed he didn’t know what’d happened to her or what she’d done, only that she was shaken and distraught. She was released from police custody shortly after her interrogation, however there is a new warrant out for her arrest for submitting a falsified police report.
“It is important that when people file a false police report, especially of this magnitude, that we hold them accountable for doing so,” said Police Chief Dyer. “Not only did this create an enormous amount of work and pulled our detectives off other cases that they could have been working or should have been working, but it created a lot of fear in our community.”
Why did Maria Gonzalez think she could get away with such a ludicrous crime? What do you think her punishment should be? Let us know in the comments down below!
