Anthony Godby Johnson
Encyclopedia
Anthony Godby Johnson is the subject and supposed author of the 1993 memoir
A Rock and a Hard Place: One Boy's Triumphant Story. Subsequent investigations suggest that there may have never been a person by this name, and that his entire story was a fabrication on the part of Vicki Johnson, the woman who purported to be his adoptive mother.
The book initially appeared to be an autobiography
describing Johnson's survival of an abusive
childhood with parents who beat him and rape
d him. The book details his abuse at the hands of his parents and their friends, and his discovery at age 11, after he had been adopted by another couple, that he had AIDS
.
When several magazines and journalists, including Newsweek
and Keith Olbermann
, attempted to investigate the claims of the book and profile Anthony, they contacted the woman who claimed to be his adoptive
mother, Vicki Johnson. Suspicion was raised when it was learned that no one other than Vicki Johnson had actually seen Anthony – not his agent, his editor, nor his publicist. Further concerns were raised when a voice analysis
expert analyzed calls from "Anthony" and identified the voice to be that of Vicki Johnson.
As a result of these irregularities, Olbermann hired an investigator, who suggested that there was no Anthony and the story was fabricated.
A Rock and a Hard Place claimed that Anthony's biological parents were arrested and tried for abusing
him, and that his police officer father was killed in prison. An alleged conspiracy
of rogue police officers trying to kill Anthony was Vicki Johnson's justification for zealously preserving Anthony's privacy. However, no case matching that description could be found at any social service agency.
Many sources find it medically implausible that Anthony could be alive, given that he has supposedly been living with AIDS
for over 19 years. Most long-term survivors are actually living with HIV
but had not yet developed AIDS; furthermore the medications that slow the progress of the disease were not known at the time that Anthony's AIDS allegedly became severe.
With so many similarities between the purported life of Anthony and proven hoaxes such as that of Kaycee Nicole
and Kodee Kennings
, the prevailing belief is that Anthony never existed.
wrote a foreword for an edition of A Rock and a Hard Place, later defending the book's veracity. Armistead Maupin
, who wrote a blurb
for an edition of A Rock and a Hard Place, later wrote The Night Listener
, a novel subsequently made into a film
, in which the main character begins correspondence with an HIV-positive boy who is not what he seems. The book parallels Maupin's experience with Johnson. The story also was adapted for a 2002 episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent
entitled "Faith", with the child's sex being changed to female and illness to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
.
On January 12, 2007, the ABC
newsmagazine program 20/20 revealed new evidence that Anthony was Vicki Johnson's fictional creation. The photo of "Anthony" that Vicki had sent to Anthony's supporters was revealed to be a childhood photo of Steve Tarabokija, now a healthy adult and a New Jersey
traffic engineer, who was shocked to find his photo being represented to people as the face of Anthony Godby Johnson. One of the viewers who recognized the photo was a woman whose son had been in the same fourth-grade class as Tarabokija. Their teacher for that class was Vicki Johnson, who was said to have taken pictures of the children in the class.
Vicki Johnson, whose real name was Joanne Vicki Fraginals, had allegedly handed Anthony over to another caretaker in 1997 when she moved to Chicago and married Marc Zackheim, a child psychologist and owner of the Associates of Clinical Psychology. In 2004, Zackheim was indicted for abusing child patients at a treatment center for troubled children in Indiana
; his trial began in 2006 at the Marshall County
courthouse. He was acquitted of one felony count of practicing medicine without a license and three misdemeanor counts of battery for inappropriately touching boys. He died of a heart attack in 2009.
Memoir
A memoir , is a literary genre, forming a subclass of autobiography – although the terms 'memoir' and 'autobiography' are almost interchangeable. Memoir is autobiographical writing, but not all autobiographical writing follows the criteria for memoir set out below...
A Rock and a Hard Place: One Boy's Triumphant Story. Subsequent investigations suggest that there may have never been a person by this name, and that his entire story was a fabrication on the part of Vicki Johnson, the woman who purported to be his adoptive mother.
The book initially appeared to be an autobiography
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
describing Johnson's survival of an abusive
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
childhood with parents who beat him and rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
d him. The book details his abuse at the hands of his parents and their friends, and his discovery at age 11, after he had been adopted by another couple, that he had AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
.
Investigation
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
and Keith Olbermann
Keith Olbermann
Keith Theodore Olbermann is an American political commentator and writer. He has been the chief news officer of the Current TV network and the host of Current TV's weeknight political commentary program, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, since June 20, 2011...
, attempted to investigate the claims of the book and profile Anthony, they contacted the woman who claimed to be his adoptive
Adoption
Adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting for another and, in so doing, permanently transfers all rights and responsibilities from the original parent or parents...
mother, Vicki Johnson. Suspicion was raised when it was learned that no one other than Vicki Johnson had actually seen Anthony – not his agent, his editor, nor his publicist. Further concerns were raised when a voice analysis
Voice analysis
Voice analysis is the study of speech sounds for purposes other than linguistic content, such as in speech recognition. Such studies include mostly medical analysis of the voice i.e. phoniatrics, but also speaker identification...
expert analyzed calls from "Anthony" and identified the voice to be that of Vicki Johnson.
As a result of these irregularities, Olbermann hired an investigator, who suggested that there was no Anthony and the story was fabricated.
A Rock and a Hard Place claimed that Anthony's biological parents were arrested and tried for abusing
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
him, and that his police officer father was killed in prison. An alleged conspiracy
Cabal
A cabal is a group of people united in some close design together, usually to promote their private views and/or interests in a church, state, or other community, often by intrigue...
of rogue police officers trying to kill Anthony was Vicki Johnson's justification for zealously preserving Anthony's privacy. However, no case matching that description could be found at any social service agency.
Many sources find it medically implausible that Anthony could be alive, given that he has supposedly been living with AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
for over 19 years. Most long-term survivors are actually living with HIV
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus is a lentivirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome , a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive...
but had not yet developed AIDS; furthermore the medications that slow the progress of the disease were not known at the time that Anthony's AIDS allegedly became severe.
With so many similarities between the purported life of Anthony and proven hoaxes such as that of Kaycee Nicole
Kaycee Nicole
Kaycee Nicole was a fictitious persona played by Debbie Swenson in a well-known case of Münchausen by Internet. Between 1999 and when the hoax was discovered in 2001, Swenson, playing the role of Kaycee, represented herself on numerous websites as a teenager suffering from terminal leukemia...
and Kodee Kennings
Kodee Kennings
Kodee Kennings was a fictional 8-year-old girl, supposedly the daughter of a U.S. Army soldier named Dan Kennings in post-invasion Iraq. Kodee's plight was detailed in letters published in the Daily Egyptian, a student newspaper for Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois, beginning in...
, the prevailing belief is that Anthony never existed.
Aftermath
Paul MonettePaul Monette
Paul Landry Monette was an American author, poet, and activist best remembered for his essays about gay relationships.-Biography:...
wrote a foreword for an edition of A Rock and a Hard Place, later defending the book's veracity. Armistead Maupin
Armistead Maupin
Armistead Jones Maupin, Jr. is an American writer, best known for his Tales of the City series of novels, based in San Francisco.-Early life:...
, who wrote a blurb
Blurb
A blurb is a short summary or some words of praise accompanying a creative work, usually used on books without giving away any details, that is usually referring to the words on the back of the book jacket but also commonly seen on DVD and video cases, web portals, and news websites.- History :The...
for an edition of A Rock and a Hard Place, later wrote The Night Listener
The Night Listener (novel)
The Night Listener is a roman à clef by Armistead Maupin. The novel's plot is based on the real life story of Anthony Godby Johnson, the purported author of a book, A Rock and a Hard Place: One Boy's Triumphant Story, that was later revealed to be a hoax.-Plot summary:Gabriel Noone is a gay writer...
, a novel subsequently made into a film
The Night Listener (film)
The Night Listener is a 2006 psychological horror film directed by Patrick Stettner. The screenplay by Armistead Maupin, Terry Anderson, and Stettner is based on Maupin's 2000 bestselling novel of the same name, which was inspired by actual events in the author's life.-Plot:Gabriel Noone , a...
, in which the main character begins correspondence with an HIV-positive boy who is not what he seems. The book parallels Maupin's experience with Johnson. The story also was adapted for a 2002 episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent
Law & Order: Criminal Intent
Law & Order: Criminal Intent is an American police procedural television drama series set in New York City, where it was also primarily produced. Created and produced by Dick Wolf and René Balcer, the series premiered on September 30, 2001, as the second spin-off of Wolf's successful crime drama...
entitled "Faith", with the child's sex being changed to female and illness to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis , also referred to as Lou Gehrig's disease, is a form of motor neuron disease caused by the degeneration of upper and lower neurons, located in the ventral horn of the spinal cord and the cortical neurons that provide their efferent input...
.
On January 12, 2007, the ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
newsmagazine program 20/20 revealed new evidence that Anthony was Vicki Johnson's fictional creation. The photo of "Anthony" that Vicki had sent to Anthony's supporters was revealed to be a childhood photo of Steve Tarabokija, now a healthy adult and a New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
traffic engineer, who was shocked to find his photo being represented to people as the face of Anthony Godby Johnson. One of the viewers who recognized the photo was a woman whose son had been in the same fourth-grade class as Tarabokija. Their teacher for that class was Vicki Johnson, who was said to have taken pictures of the children in the class.
Vicki Johnson, whose real name was Joanne Vicki Fraginals, had allegedly handed Anthony over to another caretaker in 1997 when she moved to Chicago and married Marc Zackheim, a child psychologist and owner of the Associates of Clinical Psychology. In 2004, Zackheim was indicted for abusing child patients at a treatment center for troubled children in Indiana
Indiana
Indiana is a US state, admitted to the United States as the 19th on December 11, 1816. It is located in the Midwestern United States and Great Lakes Region. With 6,483,802 residents, the state is ranked 15th in population and 16th in population density. Indiana is ranked 38th in land area and is...
; his trial began in 2006 at the Marshall County
Marshall County, Indiana
As of the census of 2000, there were 45,128 people, 16,519 households, and 12,191 families residing in the county. The population density was 102 people per square mile . There were 18,099 housing units at an average density of 41 per square mile...
courthouse. He was acquitted of one felony count of practicing medicine without a license and three misdemeanor counts of battery for inappropriately touching boys. He died of a heart attack in 2009.