US Woman Fakes Daughter's Illness For Years To Fetch Online Donation

A woman from Ohio, USA, was arrested for allegedly faking her seven-year-old daughter's sicknesses for years to collect donation money online. Pamela Reed lied to her friends, family, and social media followers saying her daughter was blind and suffered from several illnesses including cancer and regular seizures. Police reportedly said that she even regularly shaved her daughter's head to make her pseudo-narrative believable.

According to the New York Post, Reed allegedly collected thousands of dollars for her daughter's "illness". Allegedly, people “participated in fundraising efforts and had made monetary contributions to help the family offset medical costs,” the Noble County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. Reed was charged with theft by deception, a felony of the fourth degree.

How Reed Was Caught

Pamela Reed's scheme came to light last week when her daughter's elementary school nurse discovered that she was, in fact, not blind. According to court documents, the 41-year-old mother made her daughter, identified as AR in the records, miss more than 280 hours of school in the last academic year.

Reed had allegedly told the nurse that AR would have a port implanted in the future for her cancer treatments. The nurse called AR’s doctor, who confirmed, “She did not have cancer or leukaemia, and she never had cancer or leukaemia.” When caught, Reed admitted to forging the documents and prescriptions she submitted to the school claiming AR's alleged illnesses.

Reed initially tried to lie to the police before admitting to it “because she liked the support given as a result,” the affidavit states. She had been routinely posting on a social media account dedicated to donations for AR since October 2017 when the girl was just 20 months old.

She first claimed that AR had Severe Aplastic Anemia, a disease in which the bone marrow does not make enough blood cells for the body. It is not confirmed whether this illness was also faked. She later began claiming that AR had been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia and regular seizures. Even Reed's family, including her other daughter, believed that AR was sick. It has not been disclosed whether Reed's partner was in the picture.

Just days before she was caught, Reed posted on social media that AR's health was deteriorating. “When they told us this was going to be the biggest fight so far, we thought we were prepared, but nothing prepares a parent to see any of this……Our hearts are shattered with every single treatment, every single tear and every single night we have to explain, why her……because we don’t have that answer,” Reed wrote.