I lied...

May 19, 2006 17:43

... but this one was just too good to pass up.

To make up for it, I'll put the story here in a cut, along with my comments.

Magazine: 'Runaway bride,' fiancé call it quits
Duluth woman's disappearance created national media frenzy

By DUANE D. STANFORD, ROSALIND BENTLEY and STEVE VISSER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/19/06
Duluth's runaway bride and her fiancé, John Mason, may be calling it quits more than a year after she disappeared then lied about being kidnapped, according to a report on People magazine's Web site.

"I'm not confirming or denying the breakup," Jennifer Wilbanks, 33, told People on May 14. "John and I have some things to work out."

Brandon: Do we know where she was when she made this statement? Georgia? New Mexico? Fallujah?

People quoted an unnamed friend of Mason as saying, "I think John realized there were some fundamental differences in their personalities that he wasn't going to be able to deal with."

Brandon: The friend added: "The differences were things like, 'She's crazy as hell. I'm not. She's freaking bats. I'm not. She thinks the solution to cold feet is to run to New Mexico, spark a massive manhunt and then concoct a story about being sexually assaulted. I don't.'"

The magazine said Mason's father, Claude Mason, seemed relieved. "We're just glad there's a final resolution," People quoted him as saying.

Brandon: "Final resolution"? Claude, have you even been paying attention for the last year?

Attempts by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to reach Claude Mason on Friday were unsuccessful.

A woman who answered the phone at the Mason family's Duluth medical-care business, which the 33-year-old John Mason manages, said, "He's not going to talk to you" and hung up.

Wendy Cleghorn, a Wilbanks cousin who was to have been a bridesmaid at the lavish wedding-that-wasn't, said Friday morning, "I have nothing to say right now about it." She also hung up abruptly.

Brandon: You know, normally, I don't like people who won't comment. But if I'd had to answer questions about these two for the last year, I'd probably hang up too.

Mason's uncle, Dr. Miles Mason, a prominent physician in the town of more than 22,000, said he heard rumors of a breakup but couldn't confirm it was true.

Attempts to reach Wilbanks, Mason and Wilbanks' father, Harris Wilbanks, were unsuccessful.

Wilbanks disappeared four days before she was to wed Mason, a member of one of Duluth's most prominent families, in the presence of 14 bridesmaids, 14 groomsmen and 600 guests. At the time, friends and family discounted the possibility that pre-wedding jitters prompted her to take off. People feared the worst.

Vigils were held, mass searches took place, and then Wilbanks surfaced in Albuquerque, N.M., with a tale of being kidnapped and sexually assaulted. The story quickly unraveled under FBI questioning. She said she had been overwhelmed by the wedding and escaped. But the woman who fared so prominently and poorly in the public discourse remains largely a mystery.

Brandon: "Remains largely a mystery"? She's crazy. Whacked out. End of story.

In the year since:

• She paid Duluth $13,249, to compensate the city for the overtime that police officers and other employees accumulated searching for her.

• A Gwinnett County judge found her guilty of lying to police. In June, she was sentenced to two years of probation and 120 hours of community service.

• She was ordered to pay $2,650 in restitution to the state and still owes $1,370, as well as $50 to Gwinnett County, said Peggy Chapman, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections.

Wilbanks reputedly sold her story to ReganMedia for $500,000.

Brandon: That might be the saddest part of all. So many people in her family and his were worried about here and looking for her. Meanwhile, she'll get more than enough to cover her restitution and set up a nice life for herself, probably without the man she jilted. That's fair.
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