Knife-Point Kidnapping, Robbery A Lie, Woman Faces Charges

LAWRENCEVILLE, GA – A Lawrenceville woman has an active warrant for her arrest for false report of a kidnapping and robbery. On Saturday, Sept. 15, at around 11:15 a.m., a call came into the Gwinnett County Police Department 911 Center reporting that a woman had been kidnapped at knife-point and had narrowly escaped her attacker.

Hillary Black, 33, said that the incident occurred after she visited an ATM machine outside the Publix grocery store at 911 Duluth Highway in unincorporated Lawrenceville. She withdrew $200 but had another $1,200 in her purse to make a mortgage payment. After returning to her car, she told the responding officers that a Hispanic man jumped into the passenger seat of her vehicle and displayed a box cutter. According to Black, the man gave her turn-by-turn directions to an abandoned shopping center near Five Forks Trickum Road and Johnson Road.

She told the officers that she thought the man was going to sexually assault her so she began to fight with him. She said that he slashed at her causing several superficial cuts to her arms. According to the initial report, Black said that she used her pepper spray on the suspect and he fled.

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She drove to the WalMart at 1400 Lawrenceville Highway looking for a police officer. After meeting with an officer, she told him that the man stole the entire $1,400 in cash from her.

The officers assigned to the Uniform Division dispatched an off-duty, on-call detective to assist in the investigation. The detective responded to the scene and interviewed Hillary. He saw minor cuts on her arms though she didn’t need bandages. Following his interview, the detective drove around looking for the abandoned shopping center. He could not find it.

The detective then visited the Publix grocery store to view the surveillance footage. Though the angles were not favorable, he didn’t see anyone enter her vehicle after she visited the ATM machine.

A member of the Crime Scene Unit was dispatched to the scene. The detective decided to impound her vehicle and transport it to GCPD Headquarters for processing.

The detective secured a Search Warrant for Black’s vehicle. The Crime Scene Unit examined the vehicle and could not find blood, fingerprints, or any other items left by the suspect. There was no evidence to indicate that anyone else was inside her vehicle during the time of the crime.

The detective decided to re-interview Hillary. Again, she stuck to her original story. The detective mentioned the surveillance footage from the Publix. She eventually told the officer that she made the story up; it didn’t happen. The money withdrawn from the ATM was in her purse, and she never had possession of the $1,200 for the mortgage payment. She told the officer that the cuts on her arms were from an un-related event.

The detective escorted her out of the building. He later visited a Magistrate Judge and obtained one warrant for false statements. He called her and told her the warrant was active. She told him that she would turn herself in, but she has not yet been booked into the Gwinnett County Jail.

In total, five Uniform Division officers and 1 supervisor responded to the original call. One detective along with two members of the Crime Scene Unit assisted in this investigation. Combined, over 38 hours were spent investigating an incident that never happened.

"It’s unfortunate that so many officers spent their time dedicated to a crime that never happened rather than using their time to patrol neighborhoods, conduct traffic enforcement, follow up on investigations, and completing reports to name a few," Corporal Michele Pihera said in a press release.

Photo courtesy Gwinnett County Police Department