The Capital Metro bus hijacking reported Monday was part of an elaborate lie told by the bus driver to get attention, Austin police revealed Tuesday.
Money Sterling, the driver of the bus and victim of the alleged hijacking, told police Tuesday morning when she was brought in for further questioning that she had lied about the incident, said Deek Moore, an APD detective. Moore said warrants will be filed for Sterling's arrest today for perjury and filing a false police report, Class A and Class B misdemeanors.
"She told us that she's got a lot of things going on in her personal life that have caused her at the current time to be depressed," Moore said. "She indicated that it was a plea for attention."
Moore said Austin police found inconsistencies in Sterling's statements about the incident, including the route Sterling said the hijacker forced her to take to Southwest Austin. Police would be found negligent if they did not follow up on reports and investigate those reports fully, but the hoax has cost the department and taxpayers money, he said.
"It's going to be easily in the thousands of dollars, if not tens of thousands," Moore said.
Capital Metro spokeswoman Misty Whited said Sterling, 28, was suspended without pay after hearing that the incident was fabricated.
"We want our passengers to know that this is a very unusual circumstance, and we are extremely glad that it actually did not occur the way that it did," Whited said.
Sterling had been hired through Veolia Transportation, one of the three service providers used by Capital Metro.
Veolia spokesman Chris Hager said the company does background checks on all of their drivers but does not perform psychological checks. After the incident, Hager said the company will consider performing psychological tests as part of background checks for potential employees.
"If we had seen something that might have triggered this, that she was having some issues, then we would have stepped up and taken the appropriate action," Hager said, adding that Sterling had a good driving record and the only disciplinary issues had been with attendance.
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