A Texas teen who ran into a church half-naked claiming that she was gang-raped pleaded guilty for what turned out to be an elaborate hoax.
Breana Harmon, 19, agreed to a plea deal Thursday for felony charges of tampering with physical evidence and government documents in connection to the March 2017 incident, the Sherman Herald Democrat reported.
“She’s very remorseful for what she did and what she said and that’s why she decided to plead guilty,” Harmon’s attorney Bob Jarvis told the newspaper.
Authorities said the teen filed a false report to police in March 2017 claiming to have been abducted and raped behind a church in Denison, Texas.
Harmon, then 18, showed up at the local church covered in blood and wearing only a shirt, bra and underwear. Worshippers told authorities that she claimed three black men took her into the woods and raped her.
She later told investigators that a black man in a ski mask pinned her down while two others sexually assaulted her.
Harmon was brought to a hospital for examination, where doctors determined she didn’t suffer any injuries consistent with her claims, according to police.
Unable to corroborate her story, authorities confronted Harmon and she admitted the allegations were false.
She told police that she was in a fight with her fiancé that prompted her to go into the woods and cut herself. Afraid of her family’s reaction, Harmon said that she didn’t correct church-goers who found her bloody and asked if she was sexually assaulted, according to the Sherman Herald Democrat.
Her lawyers said that her “unusual” personal history may have prompted her to stage the hoax.
“I don’t want to try the case in the paper — it’ll all come out,” Jarvis told the Sherman Herald Democrat. “Let’s just say she has some fairly unusual circumstances that I think they’ll be interested to hear about.”
She is scheduled to be sentenced March 20.