A former Republican congressional candidate who during his campaign last year falsely claimed that an adult bookstore he worked at was forcing a young girl to perform sex acts earlier this month admitted the allegations were made up, authorities said.
Ryan Dark White, 54 of Baltimore, in 2022 ran as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Maryland under the name Jon McGreevey and called himself the “Patriot Whistleblower.”
“After being charged with making a false report, Ryan Dark White, otherwise known as Dr. Jon McGreevy, issued a full apology and admission to fabricating a child trafficking story for his political benefit,” The Harford County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement it posted on Twitter.
White acknowledged in his admission that “Law enforcement detectives spent hundreds of hours investigating a crime that didn’t happen.”
White’s May 11 admission follows his arrest in July on charges for filing a false report, according to the Harford County Sheriff’s Office.
But The Daily Beast’s Kelly Weill reports that “rather than confess at the time, White claimed the charges were part of a broader deep state effort to silence him and upend his congressional campaign."
Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey R. Gahler said in a statement around the time of White’s arrest that “It is shameful that a candidate for public office would make up such a story and use it to further his own political agenda.”
“It is even more appalling, that another individual, who is running for a law enforcement position, would embrace such an obviously false narrative in an effort to gain political traction – nothing more. I am beyond grateful this young girl is safe, but extremely disappointed someone would attempt to discredit and disparage the work of the dedicated men and women of the Harford County Sheriff’s Office and Child Advocacy Center. Fearmongering and antagonism caused wasted time and energy by our personnel, whose time would have been better served protecting the citizens of Harford County, instead of investigating lies.”
White, who has ties to the QAnon conspiracy movement, in the letter wrote that “On April 9th, 2022, I went to work at The Mistress. When I arrived at work, I noticed a young girl and elderly male in the store near the ATM. I immediately recognized this as an opportunity to potentially obtain traction for my political career as I was running for US Senate.”
He said his “biggest regret is lying about the child’s involvement on the day of the incident. I created a heinous lie that could potentially have led to the child being place in imminent danger. Law enforcement detectives spent hundreds of hours investigating a crime that didn’t happen.”
