US woman attempts to kidnap online 'boyfriend'
August 28, 2008
PLAYING the Internet game - Second Life - may have led her to face another kind of life - in prison.
Kimberly Jernigan, 33, started a virtual relationship with a man on Second Life. There, she played as a female avatar and he a lion.
And when the relationship failed, she allegedly tried to kidnap him twice, reported ABC news. Jernigan, 33, who is separated from her husband, met the man a few months ago.
A US news station reported she was distressed when her Second Life relationship with the 52-year-old man from Delaware ended when the pair met face-to-face.
'She started this virtual relationship and she wasn't ready to break it off,' said police spokesman Mr Trinidad Navarro.
'She had difficulty distinguishing between the virtual relationship and a real-life relationship,' he said.
Her first attempt was several weeks ago, said police.
According to police, Jernigan's virtual ex claims that she tried to kidnap him s outside his office in Pennsylvania.
'She encountered him in the parking lot and pointed a gun at him and told him to get in the car,' said Mr Navarro. 'He went off running.'
It was unclear if Jernigan was ever charged in connection with that incident. In her second attempt, she returned to Delaware disguised as a postal worker to try and find his home address - which, after four days of searching, she did.
She made her second attempt last week.
The ex-boyfriend called the police and said he escaped from his apartment because a person who he believed was Jernigan was inside with what appeared to be a Taser.
Police said they found Jernigan's dog - bound with duct tape - locked inside the apartment bathroom. They found a pair of handcuffs outside his bedroom window.
Online addiction
Jernigan faces charges of attempted kidnapping, burglary and aggravated menacing and is being held on a US$65,000 ($92,000) bond.
Her husband, Mr Michael Jernigan, said both he and his wife had become involved in online relationships through Second Life.
'We had an agreement to have a somewhat open relationship and actually being involved in a game online was a very safe way to do that,' said Mr Jernigan.
But, he said, Jernigan soon spent all her free time playing the game. 'I always knew that she could be obsessive, and that type of thing, but I never thought it would go as far as this,' he said.
Mental health experts say Internet use can progress into a form of addiction, at times leading to destructive consequences.
Dr Bankole Johnson, chair of the department of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences at the University of Virginia, said people who become so wrapped up in online worlds that they have difficulty distinguishing fantasy and reality, often have pre-existing mental illnesses. 'What people develop is a delusional idea that the (virtual) person is real,' he said.
Source:
http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/news/st...74664,00.html? 
US woman attempts to kidnap online 'boyfriend' 
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