Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
GYPSUM, Colo. — A Colorado community is reeling after finding out the boy with leukemia who united them all never existed.
The story of Alex Jordan — the boy who does not exist — began in mid-October, when Briana Augustenborg, 22, began spreading the boy's fake story: the 9-year-old was a huge football fan, was dying of cancer and wanted to spend his final months breathing the fresh mountain air.
He and his family moved to the Colorado town near Vail to give the boy what he wanted, Augustenborg claimed. She spread around the community a picture she had pulled from the website of a cancer foundation, and the story that Alex had adopted the Eagle Valley High School football team as his own.
The team united around the nonexistent boy, signing a football for him and putting A's on their helmets in his honor. A Facebook page in the boy's honor received hundreds of "likes."
"The whole community surrounded him and came forward," George Hudspeth, president of the school's athletic booster group, told The New York Times. "They were all so excited. It did show a side of the high school, that they're willing to rally and support anything."
What is most confusing to the town — and the reason Augustenborg will likely not face charges — is that the woman never asked for money. She told those who inquired about charitable donations that Alex's family had enough money, they just wanted his story to be told, according to the Vail Daily.
His story grew until he was invited to attend an Eagle Valley High football game on Oct. 26. But on Oct. 25, Augustenborg announced the boy had died. The town grieved, but some were suspicious: no one had actually seen Alex, and Augustenborg was the sole source of information about the boy. When they were unable to find a death certificate for the both, they alerted police, and the web of lies fell apart.
The team, and the town, were torn apart by the news. The newspaper published an apology for aiding in the spread of the lie, and now, the town is just trying to move beyond what they are calling a horrible wrong.
"It's not right," Jayden Mosness, a student at the school, told 9 News. "I don't think it's right for anybody to do that, to even joke about something this big."
