UPDATE: Charlie Rogers Is Guilty

I first heard about Charlie Rogers back in August. [Original post HERE]

See, Charlie Rogers, a Nebraska Lesbian claimed to have been attacked in her home, and said three men, all in black ski masks, had tied her up with zip ties, beat her and carved anti-gay slurs into her body. The men allegedly spray painted homophobic slurs around her house, and then doused it with gasoline before setting it on fire. Charlie Rogers did manage to escape around 4 a.m. and made her way to a neighbor’s home. It was an ugly story, made all the uglier by the fact that it was a lie told by Charlie Rogers herself.

Well, not exactly, I guess, because Charlie Rogers still won’t admit that she made the whole thing up. She did, however, decide to stop fighting the accusations that she'd fabricated this gay hate crime, though she maintains that it happened as she first told police. But, she's pleaded no contest in Lancaster County Court, where she was found guilty of a misdemeanor charge of false reporting. She'll be sentenced in February and faces a maximum penalty of one year in jail and a $1,000 fine. Personally, I hope they give her a year in jail. Charlie Rogers needs a time out.

While she made no statements before, during, or after the court hearing, her lawyer, Brett McArthur, says she pleaded no contest because, “She just didn’t want to sit through a two-week trial and sit through a bitter fight in court. She just didn’t have the strength right now.” McArthur said Charlie Rogers had planned to contest the charge during a January jury trial, but it just got too hard to relive the story. 

But Charlie Rogers does relive the story, a lot, mostly on Internet videos, where she accuses police of allowing her attackers to remain at large. What she doesn't talk about, at all, is the mountains of evidence that supports the claim that the person who attacked Charlie Rogers in her home that night was Charlie Rogers:

• None of the crucial physical evidence at the crime scene supported Rogers’ version of events.  She says she was tied up and beaten on her bed, yet the bed was neatly made when officers entered her home.
• Her blood was not found on the covers of the bed where she said the men had tied her up and cut her.
• No male DNA was found in a pair of gloves she said were left behind by one of her assailants.
• Dr. Michelle Elieff, a forensic pathologist, found that Charlie Rogers’ cuts appeared to be self-inflicted, and she also found no bruises on Roger's body, even though Rogers alleges that the three men beat her.
• Police officers found black clothing, a pair of white knit gloves and a red box cutter on the living room floor. Rogers denies the gloves were hers, but DNA tests proved that she was the “major contributor” of DNA inside them.
• In addition, all of those items were purchased at a local hardware store five days before the attack, and a clerk at the store has indentified Charlie Rogers as the person who bought them.
• Police say they discovered the homophobic slurs spray-painted in the basement them after Rogers told the responding officer about them the morning of her alleged attack. In later interviews, however, Rogers claimed she did not know anything about the graffiti because she left her house immediately after the attack.
• And, on July 18, just days before the alleged attack, Charlie Rogers wrote on Facebook: "So maybe I am too idealistic, but I believe way deep inside me that we can make things better for everyone. I will be a catalyst. I will do what it takes. I will. Watch me." 

Watch you? Watch you take a subject, gay bashing, gay Hate Crimes, and turn it into the Charlie Rogers' Show?

It's hard to be gay these days, what with everyone from TV preachers to Antonin Scalia, a Supreme Court Justice, denigrating the gay community as perverts and pedophiles. And it's made even harder every time someone like Charlie Rogers--who seems desperate for attention--fakes a Hate Crime for fifteen minutes of fame.

Like I said, Charlie Rogers could use a year-long time out.

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