The question everyone wants to know is why. In one of the more stunning news conferences Thursday night, Vancouver Washington police announced that a woman who said she was attacked by another woman who threw acid on her face had made the whole story up.

28-year old Bethany Storro admitted she lied when she reported an African American woman poured acid on her face when she pulled up at a local Starbucks August 30th. The story gained national attention and even led to copycat attacks across the country.

Detectives had their doubts from the beginning. Some things just didn’t add up. The burn patterns on Storro’s face were not consistent with someone splashing acid on her. She was wearing sunglasses at 7 o’clock at night. They were sunglasses she had just purchased 20 minutes before the attack and she admitted later that she never wears sunglasses. And police never could locate any witnesses.

The suspicions led police to get a warrant to search her parents’ house where she lives. During the search Storros admitted it was a hoax. Police never did locate the acid and continue to work to nail down a motive.

Storros did not shy away from the media in the days after her surgery. She did interviews and held news conferences. She was even scheduled to appear on Oprah. Did she do it for attention?

Did she do it for money? There were fundraisers held and money collected. Several banks had established funds and it’s still being investigated whether or not Storros accessed any of that money. The police say Storros has talked about a motive, but they’re not ready to release that information yet. Meantime, the banks are working to return the money that was donated.

Storros will likely be charged with filing a false police report. Vancouver police spent hundreds of hours on the case and even made contact with several people they were investigating as possible suspects. The Clark County prosecutor will be making that decision in the near future.