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Predator! True Story of a False Rumor There was no child, no lure and no creep, as the New York Post had blithely declared. But fear did reign among hundreds of Downtown parents during the summer when false rumors of an attempted child abduction in Washington Market Park spread at wildfire speed. In the days that followed, local news crews descended on the park, police patrolled the playground, the community board sought action and City Councilman Alan Gerson was poised to hold a hearing on the dangers that seemed to lurk in Tribeca’s most popular play space. What sparked this monstrous tale, and how did it spread? At first, it seemed all too plausible. Less than two months before the rumored act occurred, a nanny reported to her employer that she saw a “suspicious” young man who wanted to play chase with the child she was watching in Washington Market Park. The nanny interceded and the man left the park, according to the mother, who notified the police and the volunteer community group, Friends of Washington Market Park. An article about that report appeared in the June issue of the Trib. Responding to the possible threat, Nelle Fortenberry, president of the Friends group, alerted the park workers to be vigilant. In addition, a Parks Enforcement Patrol officer was assigned to the park. On June 24, a 19-year-old Borough of Manhattan Community College student was playing squirt guns with some children on the park lawn. Believing that the young man fit the description of the suspicious person in the first incident—and knowing that he was not there with a child—a park worker notified BMCC security, who escorted the man to the school for questioning. Security officers determined that the student never touched a child or had sordid intentions. Stories to the contrary were “bogus,” BMCC spokesman Barry Rosen later told the Trib. In a written statement taken by BMCC security at the time, the student (whose name was not publicly released) expressed outrage. “If [the caregivers] didn’t want me to play with their children they should have told me. This is unfair. If I was notified of the problem I would have stopped. No parent came!!!!” At least one nanny in the park who witnessed the student being taken away misinterpreted the scene. It appears likely that she traveled with the child she was watching to Rockefeller Park for an activity sponsored by the Battery Park City Parks Conservancy. Her version of what she thought she saw went with her. According to some accounts, a BPC park worker at the activity heard her story and retold it to another nanny. (The workers have denied a role in spreading the rumor.) But in any event, a second nanny who heard the story went home early, upset that someone had tried to “kidnap” a little girl, as the story now went. “I asked [the nanny] about it and she didn’t know a lot of details,” recalled the mother who employed the nanny. “But it occurred to me that I had read a [similar] story in the newspaper.” That mother, who asked not to be identified, was a member of the Hudson River Park Mothers Group, a network of more than 600 Lower Manhattan parents linked by the group’s Web site. She posted what she heard on its message board. “If someone tells me there is a child snatching I would tell my friends because you only have the information you have at hand,” the mother told the Trib. “Think about the alternative.” Word spread electronically through HRP Mamas, as the group is known, and onto other parent Web sites as well. “Hear about the crazy guy stalking tribeca playground? scary!” was one of the posts on UrbanBaby.com. “Any last warnings before I reserve Washington Market Park Gazebo for [my child’s] October birthday?” was another. Fortenberry said she received some 500 inquiries from worried parents. “It was this crazy virus where you couldn’t keep track of how many people were communicating on this subject,” she said. The rumor also had its share of skeptics. “These are very intelligent women and they don’t take these things at face value,” said Anna Grossman, founder of HRP Mamas. One of them, Emma Burnaby-Atkins, put it this way in a post to the Web site: “I’m sorry. But am I the only person reading about this so-called attempted abduction who smells a large brown rodent?” Noting that the mother of the supposed victim had not filed a police report, she called the story “suspicious.” Fortenberry and other members of the Park’s board tried for days to find the victim’s mother and came up dry. Fortenberry spoke to the 1st Precinct, Battery Park City and BMCC officials, park staff, and others. It was clear that no abduction attempt had occurred. But the Post story, a week after the incident supposedly occurred, gave further credence to the rumor, turning some doubters into believers. Based on hearsay, it claimed that the man from the May incident reappeared in the park and “approached a 7-year-old girl.” That article sparked a similar report on NY1 and visits to the park by other news crews. Police began patrolling the park at the request of Community Board 1, underscoring the presence of danger. It took persuasion, Fortenberry said, to convince Gerson’s office not to hold a hearing that could have inflamed fears even more. In an effort to set the record straight and discredit the Post story, Fortenberry circulated a lengthy account of what happened through the same electronic channels where the rumors first traveled and soon the worried messages to her began to evaporate. Equally assured that the rumor was only that, Anna Grossman of HRP Mamas sent a message to her members, reminding them that accuracy is important when using the group’s unmoderated message board. “Things aren’t always what they seem,” she said.
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