Local authorities have arrested a 43-year-old woman from Forsyth County for allegedly making numerous false reports that her child was being molested by the father. 

Tamara Michelle Abernathy was arrested May 31 after an investigation revealed that she had allegedly coached her 4-year-old child to make false statements to deputies, according to Cpl. Doug Rainwater of the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office.

Rainwater said for some time Abernathy has made reports to the sheriff’s office, claiming her child was being molested, but that each time investigators dismissed the charges due to “holes and inconsistencies in the story.”

He said that Abernathy was finally charged when sheriff’s office investigators and employees with the Forsyth County Division of Family and Children Services conducted “forensic interviews” in which the child allegedly admitted to being coached on what to say.

“We believe that it was her intent to have her ex-husband jailed for child molestation,” Rainwater said. “What she was putting this child through was crazy.”

Rainwater added that they take false reports seriously, especially reports of molestation due to how intensely they are investigated and the dire lasting consequences they can have on an individual’s life.

“In those cases, two detectives stop what they are doing and respond to the scene immediately, and we send as many people as we need,” Rainwater said.

Abernathy was booked into the Forsyth County Jail charged with cruelty to children, interference with custody, making false reports of a crime, and false statements or concealing evidence, and was released shortly after on a bond of $29,500.

Attempts to reach Abernathy were unsuccessful as of press time.