By: Tracie Carter
Image Credit: newjerseyglobe.com
Federal prosecutors have charged a New Jersey woman with staging a violent attack and falsely reporting to authorities that she had been assaulted at gunpoint because of her job with a federal official, Acting U.S. Attorney and Special Attorney Alina Habba announced.
Natalie Greene, 26, of Ocean City, faces one count of conspiracy to convey false statements and hoaxes, and one count of making false statements to federal law enforcement.
She appeared in federal court on November 19, 2025, before U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth A. Pascal and was released on a $200,000 unsecured bond with additional court-ordered conditions.
According to court documents, the scheme unfolded late on July 23, 2025, when Greene’s co-conspirator called 911 reporting that the two women had been attacked by three men while walking along a trail at a nature preserve in Egg Harbor Township.
The caller claimed the attackers targeted Greene specifically because of her employment with a federal official whose identity is known to investigators.
When officers arrived, they found Greene lying in a wooded area just off the trail, bound at her hands and feet with black zip ties.
Her shirt had been pulled over her head and secured with another zip tie.
She had multiple cuts across her face, neck, upper chest, and shoulder, and derogatory phrases were written across her stomach and back.
Greene was crying, screaming, and claiming that one of the alleged assailants had a gun.
Greene later repeated the story to local police and again to a federal agent after receiving medical treatment.
But investigators soon discovered the attack never occurred.
According to the criminal complaint, Greene had actually hired a body modification and scarification artist to inflict the cuts in a pattern she had designed herself.
Police searching her vehicle found black zip ties similar to those used to bind her, and detectives learned that two days before the supposed attack, her co-conspirator’s phone had been used to search “zip ties near me.”
Prosecutors say the entire scene was staged to appear as a politically motivated assault involving firearms, triggering a federal investigation.
The conspiracy charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. Additional charges may carry further penalties as the case moves forward.