I have a 15 y/o juvenile who sneaked out of her house w/o her mother's permission. When she returned and her mother asked her whereabouts, she fabricated a story that she had been kidnapped by a man who tried to sexually assault her. The alleged male subject was jailed for several weeks while our investigators,the Texas Rangers and even the FBI assisted in the investigation. The girl eventually gave a written confession that her story was a fabrication.

The case was forwarded to me as a class B misdemeanor, "false report to police officer." Surely there has to be a felony charge for that young lady. Anyone have any ideas?

Unfortunately had several just like that including one where the girl went so far as to pick a guy out of a line up. We thought about tampering with a gov. document but ended up doing a false report.
In juvi it really doesn't matter misd or felony unless you think you have enough to send her to TYC or you want to certify her.

Won�t help on juvy but we had a dad accuse his estranged wife�s boyfriend of molesting his 7 year old daughter. Daughter originally stuck with story fed to her by dad but later recanted. We had wife contact husband on a recorded line to confront him about the daughter�s recantation. Dad admitted getting the girl to lie and lying to police.

False report just didn�t seem enough (daughter had gone through a complete sexual assault exam and forensic interview) so we invited dad to the Grand Jury. Of course at GJ, he was not aware we had the recorded conversation with his wife. He stuck to the original story even though I all but begged him to recant. He was subsequently charged and convicted of aggravated perjury and sentenced to 10 years to do.

You could do the same thing with a juvi in grand jury now that the family code gives you the option of taking juvi case before the GJ. But with the above scenario, your girl already knows the gig is up and I'm sure (if she testified at all) her story would not be the same !

Thanks for the comments. Bad situation, bad law. Juveniles should not be able to ruin peoples' lives and get away with nothing but a class B misdemeanor.

Why not allege the "victim" was a party to kidnapping -- the unlawful confinement of the defendant?

John, can you give me a few more details as to how you would proceed?

Unlawful restraint might be an easier charge. The defendant, by deliberately lying to the police, caused them to restrain the victim in a jail. I'm just thinking out loud.

We need to amend the statute to increase the punishment to a felony when a person is jailed based on a false report.

If, as part of the police report, the "victim" gave a sworn, notarized affidavit/statement, which, as in this case is later proven to be a lie, would a charge of aggravated perjury not be proper?

There isn't any official proceeding in connection with that lie. It would be appropriate, however, to seek the legislature's support for an enhancement of a false report to a felony (maybe equal to the crime charged) if the false statement results in the wrongful incarceration of an individual. Seems like you would want to make the statute of limitations long, given that it might take awhile to discover the lie. Such a law could be used in some of these recantation cases that result in the release of a person from prison.

Under a 7.02(a)(1) theory of parties liability, you might also look at Tampering with a Government Record to the extent your "victim" caused an officer to prepare an investigative report, affidavit or complaint. You get to a State Jail Felony with "intent to harm another."

Yeah, but was the Intent to harm another, or was the Intent to keep Mom from harming that butt for coming in late?