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The Case of Ashley Todd: Political Attack or Personality Disorder?

Ashley Todd, Attacked or Self Inflicted?

This morning, I turn on the news and see the interesting and perhaps tragic case of Ashley Todd. A young woman from Texas who campaigned for McCain reported to police that she was attacked by an African American man at an ATM on Wednesday night. Todd claims that when the attacker saw her McCain bumper-sticker he turned around, attacked her some more, pinned her to the ground, and carved a backwards “B” into her face. According to the police report the attacker "called her a lot of names and stated that 'You are going to be a Barack supporter,' at which time she states he sat on her chest, pinning both her hands down with his knees, and scratched into her face a backward letter 'B' on the right side of her face using what she believed to be a very dull knife."

The woman refused medical treatment, there is no video from the ATM, no eye witnesses on a very busy street filled with restaurants and bars, and no medical evidence otherwise. Police are now stating that the woman is alleging sexual assault as well, which was not in her original report.

Pittsburgh police came out this morning and stated that due to the amount of inconsistencies in her story, they have given her a polygraph and that it is appearing more and more as though this story may be a hoax.

Whether this is a hoax or not, it is indeed a tragic story. If one were to take her at her word, it shows the sad and angry state of the election on both sides of the political spectrum. If, in fact, her story is a hoax, then is speaks to a dangerous and increasing problem in this country of self-mutilation.

In my time in the field, I have witnessed a tremendous amount of self-mutilation both severe and surface. This particular marking on her face looks very familiar to me. It is a surface scratch that did not break deep skin. It was not a mark hastily done as it was made very clear with little evidence of multiple scratches, which usually indicate a certain amount of desperation or hastiness. It appears to be a single stroke cut, which would be extremely difficult to do, even pinned down in a struggle. One would imagine that you would try to shake your heard about to avoid such mutilation and such a struggle would not yield such a flawless, albeit backward, “B”. Then there is the issue of the backwardness itself, which I have also seen before where someone would cut in front of a mirror.   

More often times than not, cutting occurs because the person perceives a certain amount of real or imagined abandonment and often make these allegations to receive attention to a much larger personal affliction. While I do not claim to know anything of this woman’s personal life, I can look at this from a political perspective due to the nature of the act. If you take the political body and look at it as a person for a moment, McCain’s campaign would be one who could be perceived as being abandoned, put down, or left behind in the recent weeks. If you place a personality disorder on this metaphorical body for a moment, one might see an action of acting out such as this.

As I stated, this was only my first gut reaction before any details were even released about the case as being somewhat of a veteran of ERs and inpatient psychiatric units over the years. For Ashley Todd’s sake, I do hope I am wrong, as I would never wish the torture of a personality disorder upon anyone. If I am not it speaks to a much larger problem in this country, that I would hope with this case, brings the daily, non-politically motivated actions such as this to a brighter light.