Carlee Russell.Photo:Hoover Police Dept/Twitter
Hoover Police Dept/Twitter
WillCarlee Russell, the 25-year-old Alabama nursing student who faked her disappearance, face charges?
Some experts believe law enforcement has no choice but to charge Russell, who through her attorney admitted to lying about her abduction.
“She is likely going to be charged for filing a false police report and there is plenty of evidence against her,” says former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani. “It is a pretty strong case."
Rahmani says prosecutors and law enforcement “like to send a message because there are limited resources and there are real crimes not being investigated.”
“When law enforcement is wasting time, it is money and it is resources that could be devoted to actual victims of crime,” he tells PEOPLE.
Alabama trial attorney Eric Guster says Russell is possibly facing misdemeanor charges that include making a false police report and making false statements to an official.
Carlee Russell.Hoover Police Dept/Twitter
If found guilty, she might have to pay restitution for the time police spent investigating.
“I would not be surprised if part of any agreement that she has she has to pay at least some amount of man hours and refunding man-hours that Hoover (Ala., police) put into it, because I’m quite certain that all hands were on deck,” he tells PEOPLE. “You think about the police officers who were supposed to be off that weekend. The school year is coming up soon, so I’m sure some people canceled their beach vacations to look for someone who ended up being safe the whole time.”
On Tuesday, Russell’s attorney Emory Anthony said he expected charges to be filed against Russell after a Tuesday meeting with Hoover police. “It was a great meeting; It was a short meeting,” Anthony said, according toWHNT.“We tried to identify some things about where we go from here; there’s responsibilities that we need to take care of.”
Russelladmitted Monday that she fabricated the storyabout her kidnapping, which made national headlines and led to a 49-hour manhunt across the state.
She vanished the night of July 13 after reporting to 911 operators that she saw a toddler walking alone alongside I-495. She later told police that when she went to search for the toddler, a man “came out of the trees” and kidnapped her.
After two days, Russell returned home and only gave a brief statement to police explaining her disappearance, while her family maintained on social media and in a televised interview they couldn’t provide more details because of the ongoing investigation.
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Investigators uncoveredsurveillance footageshowing Russell sneaking toilet paper and a robe from her job the night she claimed she was kidnapped. They also found evidence she stocked up on snacks at Target before calling 911, while her internet search history in the days leading up to her disappearance showed she was looking up information aboutAmber Alerts, local bus tickets for the night she went missing, as well as the movieTaken.
“The community in Birmingham, we’re tired. It’s been eight days since she was missing, six days since she came back home and people are tired, we want it over,” says Guster. “Whatever the end resolution or getting to the end resolution is, we want that to happen soon.”
source: people.com
