Forwarded email claims a woman in Virginia Beach, VA was approached at a gas station by a man with a suspiciously large ring who 'injected her with something like a date rape drug' by squeezing her hand.
Description: Forwarded email / Urban legend
Circulating since: Nov. 2010
Status: False
Example:
Email text contributed by Janet W., Nov. 9, 2010:
A recent incident occurred on the Sandbridge road leading past LAGOMAR.
Sent from a friend.
PLEASE READ!! This is happening close to home!!!! The victim is fine--, she is a Paramedic from the Sandbridge area:
At the JUNIOR MARKET on Sandbridge Rd, near the villages of LAGOMAR and HERITAGE PARK, a woman from Sandbridge was pumping gas when a man came up and asked her for money for gas. She gave him a few dollars then she finished pumping gas. She was on the phone with a friend of hers at the time. Before she got back into the car, the man came back, grasped her hand and wrist and acted like he was shaking her hand saying "Thank you so much for your generosity." He was wearing a very large ring and squeezed her hand tightly. The woman got in her car and as she pulled out, a car cut her off in front and another car pulled in and tailed her closely. Within a mile the woman told her friend on the phone she felt dizzy and was going to pass out. Her friend told her not to pull over but find the closest public place. She made it to the parking lot of Margie and Rays and passed out on the front steps. She had two puncture wounds on her wrist and the toxicology report showed she had been injected with something like the date rape drug. People think these men are targeting women who they suspect to be close to home when they get gas then follow them, hoping they will pass out in their driveways or homes so they have full access to them in a private location. Be aware, be safe, please share!!!!
Analysis: What's true in the above message is that a Virginia Beach, VA woman reported an incident resembling the one described and was examined at a local hospital. Virtually everything else is false.
According to WAVY-TV News in Virginia Beach, the "incident" was investigated by police and ruled "an urban myth fed by the Internet." The report said, in part:
Police said there was no evidence to support the two key elements of the story in the e-mail pertaining to an alleged attempt to inject a woman with a drug or toxin that led to the illness she experienced shortly after her encounter."From the hospital findings, there were no puncture wounds, no marks. No kind of injuries to her and the hospital cannot find anything medically wrong with her. So everything after that that's in the e-mail that talks about the date-rape drug, that talks about the puncture wounds, every thing in there to this point, we have deemed as false," said Bernstein.
See also:
Burundanga Drug Warning
In which it's claimed that a woman in Katy, Texas nearly passed out after being handed a business card impregnated with burundanga, a South American street drug.
The Knockout Perfume
In which it's claimed that miscreants have been caught tricking unsuspecting female victims into inhaling ether-tainted perfume and robbing them after they lose consciousness.
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Sources and further reading:
Ominous Email Circulates in Va. Beach
WAVY-TV News, 9 November 2010
Last updated 11/18/10
