UI student charged after fabricating her own kidnapping

IOWA CITY - A 21-year-old University of Iowa student was arrested Friday for alleging a report of her own kidnapping.

Authorities said they used police and Iowa Dept. of Public Safety resources to investigate the alleged kidnapping of Kelsey L. Hoffman, of Fort Dodge, who reported on Sept. 23 she was snatched from behind her apartment on Iowa Avenue and awoke hours later at a parking ramp.

In what police called an "extensive and intense investigation," they learned Hoffman had gone out drinking the night before and that she continued with her tale because "things had gone too far to come out with the truth," she told police.

Hoffman told police she became unconscious and was dragged away from her building, but claimed to remember nothing after she was grabbed. During a final interview, police said Hoffman told her roommate she had been attacked , causing her roommate to call 9-1-1 when officers quickly responded.

Police said Hoffman chose not to end the investigation with her confession, but had many opportunities to do so.

She is charged with making a false report of an indictable crime to law enforcement authorities, a serious misdemeanor.

She has since been released from the Johnson County Jail.