Reward offered in firearm thefts in Raceland
March 8, 2017
Terrebonne hires consultant for mitigation programs
March 9, 2017
Susan LeBlanc had begun to worry Tuesday afternoon. Her 13-year-old son wasn’t home yet, and the bus always arrived at the same time each afternoon. But just when she was about to call the school there he was, bursting through the door. Breathless. A little banged up in the knee.
Then the words came tumbling out of the boy’s mouth, a detailed tale about a white van and a bald man with facial hair offering a ride, the boy refusing all the while, until the man grabbed him.
Susan believed him. The deputies who responded to her call believed him.
But in the end the story proved false.
Now Susan is left with regrets for posting the details on Facebook. Arrangements for counseling are in the works.
“The juvenile stated that there was an older white male, driving a white in color older model van, (who) attempted to kidnap him,” said Major Malcolm Wolfe of the Terrebonne Parish Sheriff’s Office. “This information was disseminated throughout the Houma area and police patrolled in search of this suspect and vehicle. This information was also shared on Facebook by multiple residents in the area.”
Indeed, once Susan posted the tale of the attempted abduction it was shared from parent to parent, with accompanying comments including someone who said vans have been hunting kids all over.
In the end it was a deputy at the boy’s school who elicited a confession to the telling of an alternative truth. If the story was not true, the officer told the boy, then as things go on it will be much, much worse. He could end up having to stay in juvenile detention.
“Long story short, we learned (he) made up the story of someone trying to abduct him,” Susan said. “There is no white van, no creepy bald man looking for kids, none of that. It’s unclear exactly why he said that but we at school gets the impression that he’s having a tough time with friends. That he fabricated the story to get attention from the friends who are not friends to begin with.”
Susan now feels horrible for sharing the story, something she only did after the police had taken their report, after she and her son had ridden around the neighborhood, looking for the van, and after deputies had done so as well. She made the decision to share details of the report in hopes that other parents would be alerted, and only after considerable time spent questioning in her own mind whether she should.
“I am not someone who posts things that happen within my home. I finally decided that if I didn’t post this and something happened to someone else I couldn’t live with it,” Susan said. “I’m shocked and sitting here numb that this has happened … I can’t apologize enough.”
Although she believed her son – and wanted him to know that he was believed – a few details on the abduction were not adding up, Susan acknowledges. The boy’s narrative included mention of a good Samaritan‘s assistance being the reason he got away. But the man who stepped forward to help, the boy said, disappeared.
“I found it difficult to imagine that someone would help like that and then be nowhere to be found,” Susan said. “But I had no reason to doubt him.”
The motive, as determined through discussions between the mother, authorities and the boy, was that he had to account for not being home at the time expected, which had something to do with a situation with friends.
The boy was charged as a juvenile with criminal mischief by reporting a false incident. Because it is a misdemeanor juvenile charge, The Times is opting to not identify him by name. Susan’s widely distributed Facebook posts were made under her name.
“He has been dealt with according to the law and with me as his mother,” Susan said. “This is not like him, at all. I know every parent says that about their child but it’s true.”
