Self-Described Hero A Phony, Police Say

A man who claimed he rescued a woman from three rapists a month ago merely faked the incident to impress his girlfriend, Post Falls Police said Tuesday.

Robert Stephen Levan also faked his own kidnapping, Spokane Sheriff’s officials said.

“As it turned out, he lied from start to finish,” said Post Falls Police Sgt. Dick Halligan.

Halligan said he will request that criminal charges of obstructing a police officer be filed against Levan. Spokane authorities do not expect to file charges, said Spokane Sheriff’s Lt. Clyde Ries.

The whole thing began Dec. 17 when the 40-year-old Spokane resident arrived cut and bleeding at The Falls Club in Post Falls.

Levan told his girlfriend, who works at the bar, that he had just daringly rescued a woman from three attackers.

The girlfriend called Post Falls police, who became suspicious because of inconsistencies in the story. No victim ever turned up.

Investigators became more suspicious after Levan’s girlfriend asked a police officer about the fate of the woman Levan rescued.

Levan had told his girlfriend the woman was found dead and he’d gone to identify her body, Sgt. Halligan said.

This past Sunday morning, Spokane sheriff’s deputies found Levan handcuffed and blindfolded at Valley Mission Park near Interstate 90.

Levan told a Spokane deputy that two masked men kidnapped him at gunpoint on Jan. 11. They were the same men he had rescued the woman from, he told investigators.

Ries said Levan claimed the men handcuffed and blindfolded him and took him to a room where they kept him for five days, then beat him up and dumped him in the park some time Sunday.

Again, Ries said officers were suspicious.

Levan called Spokane and Post Falls officials earlier this week and told them he made everything up.

Levan told investigators he faked the kidnapping in an attempt to convince Post Falls police he really had rescued the woman.

He cut himself with a razor and beat himself with a belt to make it look as though he really had been attacked and kidnapped.