Anatomy of a Mugging

Reports circulated this morning that a radio personality at Air America, Randi Rhodes, had been mugged in New York City on Sunday. Talk among her fellow personalities at Air America quickly made mention of an evil right wing conspiracy to shut her up.

Jon Elliott was extremely agitated when he reported on the incident. He opened his show by saying “it is with sadness that tonight I inform you that my Air America colleague Randi Rhodes was assaulted last night while walking her dog near her New York City home.”

Pointing out that Rhodes was wearing a jogging suit and displayed no purse or jewelry, Elliott speculated that “this does not appear to me to be a standard grab the money and run mugging.”

“Is this an attempt by the right wing hate machine to silence one of our own,” he asked. “Are we threatening them. Are they afraid that we’re winning. Are they trying to silence intimidate us.”

Curious. Is this that unfunny version of satire that we've come to expect from lefties, or a serious shot at conservatives, who are a distinct minority in New York City.

Elliott made those claims well before the facts were in.

I wrote the following, assuming that a crime had been committed.

Well, it turns out that there was no crime.

Rhodes was never mugged.

It seems that Randi Rhodes simply fell while walking her dog and that explains her absence from the air and her fellow talk radio hosts started this nonsense out of whole cloth.

A police source said Rhodes never filed a report and never claimed to be the victim of a mugging. Cops from Manhattan's 17th Precinct called her attorney, who told them Rhodes was not a victim of a crime, the source said.

Rhodes' lawyer told the Daily News she was injured in a fall while walking her dog. He said she's not sure what happened, and only knows that she fell down and is in a lot of pain. The lawyer said Rhodes expects to be back on the air Thursday. He stressed there is no indication she was targeted or that she was the victim of a "hate crime."

So, far from this being a hate crime, a bias attack, or the attack of the vast right wing conspiracy, we have a talk show host who couldn't put one foot in front of the other and tripped and hurt herself, and a fellow talk show host who immediately assumed that this was the work of evil right wingers.

Funny how that happens.

Still, I wish Rhodes a speedy recovery, and will continue not listening to her show. It's the least I can do.

UPDATE:
Did alcohol play a role? That's what a poster at Gawker is submitting. Via Ace. Ouch.