Louisiana Man Arrested For Reporting A Kidnapping

Marrero, LA – According to a report filed with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office, 32-year-old Kynisha Kinney was pulled off the street and into a car against her will on Easter Sunday.

Kinney had been standing outside of a home in the 1000 block of Garden Road early Sunday. A friend stated Kinney was talking to a man in a black Cadillac who subsequently kidnapped her and sped off toward the West Bank Expressway. Friends attempted to chase the vehicle, but it managed to evade them on the expressway.

That was the story 55-year-old Craig Trufant gave authorities. But the kidnapping never happened. Trufant falsified the claims of Kinney’s kidnapping out of revenge as the woman owed him money for drugs. Trufant was arrested for filing a phony report after authorities issued a warrant on his residence where the alleged kidnapping occurred.

Along with false swearing, Trufant will face charges related to possession of crack cocaine, possession of drug paraphernalia, being a fugitive from Gretna police, and being a fugitive from his probation and parole officer.

Kinney’s version of events differed slightly. She clarified Trufant made the erroneous accusation in order to get another acquaintance arrested for the kidnapping because that person owed him drug money.

In a similar story in March, Hidalgo County authorities in Mission, Texas realized 17-year-old Ross De La Rosa was crying wolf about being kidnapped, beaten, and carjacked after they discovered his van abandoned along the banks of the Rio Grande. Inside investigators found over 500 pounds of marijuana.

The teen denied any involvement with the drug smuggling, telling authorities he left the van on the side of the road with the keys in it without explanation. The case is still under investigation by the US Customs and Border Protection.

Rahmell Pettway (also known as Rahmell Wallace), 36, faked his own kidnapping and went missing for two weeks in February. When he was finally located, Pettway was unable to recall what happened during the time of his absence. He later told authorities two men in a light blue minivan abducted him near Bainbridge Street and Reid Avenue in Brooklyn, and he was later dumped at Macon Street and Malcomb X Boulevard. The motive for his misguided attempt to cover up his absence – fear of his lover’s wrath as he was unwilling to admit where he really had been for the two weeks.

According to Lowering the Bar, in July 2005, Douglas Kelly of New Orleans tried to pull the same ruse – faking his own kidnapping in order to avoid the temperamental wrath of his pregnant girlfriend over spending $500 to strippers.

Kelly told authorities he spent his evening at a gentleman’s club called Scuttlebutt’s and was heavily inebriated. The next thing he remembered was waking in the passenger side of his car with the keys and $500 missing. He initially filed a kidnapping report but later confessed to doing so under false pretenses and that he had in order to insulate himself from the fury of his pregnant girlfriend.

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