Getting caught confessing with a mic that was on.
An army colleague revealing the truth about a beloved contestant on America's Got Talent.
Lying made these people infamous, but how did they react when confronted with the truth?
Rachel Doleza was famed for her activism, but now she's famous for something else entirely.
The educator was president of Spokane NAACP and taught African-American Studies at
Eastern Washington University. But there is just one problem:
she is white, but she deceived people into believing she was a Black woman for years.
Speculation about Dolezal's ancestry arose in 2015 after she posted a photo of an African-American
man, claiming to be her father. Subsequently, she was approached by local ABC affiliate KXLY4,
who questioned whether the man in the photo was indeed her dad.
As it turned out, Dolezal was born a white, blond woman whose parents are, you guessed it,
white, according to The Guardian. Dolezal's blatant lies led to her becoming a punchline,
with Maya Rudolph famously parodying her on Late Night with Seth Meyers.
All barbs aside, Dolezal's behavior was inherently harmful to Black people.
As argued by Denene Millner in an article for NPR,
"It is the ultimate in white privilege, really, for a white woman to see that
diamond, [...] and pluck it for her own, like it's a gift from Tiffany's, with seemingly
zero regard for the pressure, the heat, the pain it went through to earn that shine."
When country music hopeful Tim Poe appeared on Season 7 of America's Got Talent,
the judges were understandably moved by tales of his experiences in Afghanistan. Poe said on the
show that he threw himself into the line of fire to save the lives of his comrades from a grenade.
"And it broke my back and gave me a brain injury, so that's the reason why I stutter a little bit."
The aspiring musician claimed that, prior to his accident,
he had never sung before, but his injury propelled him to seek out his dreams.
But it didn't take long for people to spot the cracks in his story. One of Poe's former
army colleagues was disturbed by what he saw on TV, revealing that not only was Poe
not injured in a grenade attack, but he also lied about receiving the Purple Heart Medal.
Following these revelations, Poe was confronted by ABC News.
"It's the truth that I truly think is real."
Psychic Sylvia Browne was a mainstay of The Montel Williams Show, but when an audience
member wanted answers about what happened to her boyfriend, she was left red-faced. The
woman explained that her boyfriend died several years earlier and his body was never found.
"The reason why you didn't find him is because he's in water."
The woman explained that her partner was a firefighter on 9/11,
looking in disbelief as Browne sheepishly went on,
"He says he couldn't breathe and he's filled with water."
As The Guardian noted, Browne was branded a fraud after several of
her other so-called visions also turned out to be false. For instance, in 2004
she told the mother of missing woman Amanda Berry that Berry was dead. However,
Berry was found alive in 2013, one of three young women kidnapped and imprisoned by
Ariel Castro for a decade. Tragically, Berry's mother died believing her daughter was dead.
According to the Associated Press, she was said to have "died of a broken heart."
Browne died in 2013, aged 77. Ironically, she had wrongly predicted her own death,
having once told Larry King that she would live to 88.
Ever since the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, Prince Andrew has been at the forefront of sexual
misconduct allegations. The royal admitted to being pals with the convicted sex offender,
but claimed he didn't know about the crimes his friend was committing.
Andrew's interview with the BBC, which was intended to tell his side of the story,
turned into a farce. He insisted that he had never met Virginia Giuffre, the woman who
accused him of sexually abusing her in 2001 when she was just 17. When journalist Emily Maitlis
asked him how he could explain a photograph of himself and Giuffre, the prince replied,
"I can't. [...] From the investigations that we've done, you can't prove whether or not
that photograph is faked or not because it is a photograph of a photograph of a photograph."
"Again, I have absolutely no memory of that photograph ever being taken."
What's more, he also said that he couldn't sweat — a claim that has also been met with
skepticism — and that on the day of the alleged assault he was in a pizza restaurant. As Maitlis
argued, it was odd that he could remember the exact date he ate pizza two decades ago,
but couldn't remember meeting Giuffre. Former diplomat Craig Murray told Vanity Fair,
"The only true thing Prince Andrew said the entire interview was that he never pays for the drinks."
Andrew later settled with Giuffre out of court.
Real estate tycoon Robert Durst had long been implicated in the 2000 murder of
his friend Susan Berman. Filmmaker Andrew Jarecki conducted a series of interviews
with Durst for his 2015 documentary The Jinx. Throughout the documentary,
Durst denied any involvement in Berman's murder. The main piece of evidence in the case
was a letter sent to the police with Berman's address and the word "cadaver" written on it.
Shown the letter, Durst noted that "Beverly Hills" was misspelled. Later,
Jarecki discovered a letter Durst had written to Berman;
the handwriting was exactly the same and "Beverly" was again misspelled.
Durst was tangled in his own web of lies when presented with the two indistinguishable letters:
one that he previously admitted to writing,
and one that he had earlier said could only have been written by the killer.
"Can you tell me which one you didn't write?"
"No."
Later, not realizing his mic was still on,
he later appeared to confess to the murder in the restroom.
In 2021, he was convicted of Berman's murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. Having
died just months into his sentence, Durst has been implicated in other women's disappearances.
If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault,
help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network
website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).