A 27-year-old man who reported being stabbed at Montford Park in Blaine the evening of Aug. 17 allegedly made it up, the Blaine Police Department said.
Police have arrested Logan Dunlaing, a Blaine area resident, on suspicion of making a false report and abuse, which is a misdemeanor.
Dunlaing originally told the Blaine Police Department that he had been working on a trail inside the park when an unknown man attacked him with a knife about 7:10 p.m. Aug. 17, and cut him above his right eye.
He reported the attack nearly an hour later, according to a previous police report.
Two days after the reported attack, Blaine police said an investigation unearthed a number of inconsistencies and when confronted with them, Dunlaing said he had “possibly suffered a mental health-related episode.”
Police said those inconsistencies included:
the lack of a crime scene despite a thorough search.
no blood evidence in the area where Dunlaing said he had parked.
injuries that weren’t consistent with the reported assault.
neighbors saying they didn’t see Dunlaing or his vehicle in the area he said he had been. Their security cameras also didn’t capture images of the man or his vehicle.
security footage showing Dunlaing coming from a different direction than he told police when he went to call 911.
K-9 teams called in to help find a suspect’s scent didn’t find one, “because there was no suspect,” Blaine police said in a statement on its Facebook page.
Officers from the Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office and a Bellingham Police Department K-9 unit helped Blaine police search for an “attacker,” and police received surveillance footage as well.
Blaine police referenced the effort — from law enforcement, residents and businesses — that went into the search for an attacker they said didn’t exist.
“A tremendous amount of law enforcement time and resources were dedicated to finding the suspect and keeping our community safe,” the department said in the statement. “Blaine officers canvassed the entire area, speaking with nearly every homeowner and every business that might have footage of the incident.”
