When I read the Washington Post’s account of Roy Moore’s alleged sexual misdeeds towards Leigh Corfman, one detail rang particularly false. Corfman told the Post that she spoke with Moore on her phone in her bedroom. As one woman of my acquaintance who lived in the deep South during that era guaranteed, 14 year-old girls in Alabama didn’t have phones in their rooms back then.
Corfman, it turns out, was no exception. Aaron Klein reports that Corfman’s mother, Nancy Wells, told Breitbart News that her daughter did not have a phone in her bedroom during the period when Moore allegedly called the girl.
However, Wells stands by the rest of the story reported by the Post.
Does Corfman’s faulty recollection about the phone undercut the thrust of that story? I spent decades working with and examining witnesses. In my view, Corfman’s mistake about the bedroom phone is the kind of error people often make when trying to remember details from the distant past. I don’t think her mistake regarding this detail bears much on her overall credibility.
Corfman’s claim of sexual misconduct by Moore is not a detail. If she is erring about this matter, she’s not failing to remember something incidental. Her “error,” if she’s making one, is of a different nature — a lie, a delusion, or a substantial embellishment.
I think there are substantial reasons to disbelieve Corfman’s claim of improper sexual touching. I discussed them here. I don’t think her mistake about the location of the phone provides much additional reason to dispute her claim.
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