When a crime happens eye witness testimony can often be unreliable, sometimes a witness can have an ulterior motive to be dishonest or can simply be confused by traumatic events. This is why having a good security camera system is so valuable in a police investigation, they can provide an impartial and untainted account of events.
In Madison, Wisconsin a twenty year old female college student went missing early one Saturday morning in march of 2004, her purse and other personal effects were left in her apartment. Believing that she'd been abducted, hundreds of people including students, teachers, family and many residents of the area joined the Madison police department, the university police and the Dane County Sheriff's Office in a massive search for her. They combed the campus area and the rest of the city for any sign of the missing woman, without finding much of a clue. The one bit of evidence that was found concerning the case was footage recorded by her apartment building's security cameras, showing her leaving the building by herself early Saturday morning. Captain Luis Yudice of the Madison police department said that the manner in which she left the apartment wasn't consistent with her normal behavior pattern.
Four days after the young woman went missing, she was found in a marsh about two miles from her apartment, curled up in the fetal position. She had minor injuries and seemed to be in good condition, but was taken to a near by hospital for observation. She told the police that she'd been abducted from her apartment at knife point and held against her will. She also reported that her kidnapper used duct tape, rope, cold medicine and a knife to keep her captive and that her captor was still in the marsh area. This caused a massive manhunt that included snipers on the roofs of buildings in the area, they believed the suspect was armed and dangerous.
Soon after the young woman was found the police began to find evidence that led them to believe that her story wasn't entirely accurate. Investigators located surveillance camera footage from a local store that showed her purchasing duct tape, rope, cold medicine and a knife before her disappearance, all of the items that the student reported that her abductor had used to hold her against her will. Later, Two witnesses came forward to say that they had seen the student walking freely around the city during the time after her disappearance, but before she was found. Detectives also found evidence on her computer indicating that that she'd planned her kidnapping including a search history of wooded areas, parks, and weather forecasts for the time she was missing. Once their suspicions had been raised, the police officers realised that the video showing her leave her apartment building by herself contradicted her story of being taken from her room.
Once the student was confronted with this new evidence she quickly confessed to staging her own abduction in an attempt to gain attention from her boyfriend. She pleaded guilty to two counts of obstruction for lying to the police and received three years of probation plus she was ordered to repay the Madison police department $250 a month for three years to help pay back the ninety six thousand dollar cost of the investigation. The young woman said, "I set up everything. I'm just so messed up. I'm sorry".
It's great that this young woman wasn't harmed in anyway, but the investment of public and private resources for the search was substantial. Without the surveillance cameras to provide unblinking, unbiased evidence further resources would have been used to continue the fruitless search for the fictitious abductor.
