Student charged with falsely reporting rape in Michigan

Pictured: Mary Zolkowski, 21, who has appeared in court on one count of falsely reporting a felony - and could be punished with four years in jail and a fine of $2,000

A woman has been charged after falsely claiming that she was raped on a college campus.

Mary Zolkowski, 21, claimed that she was attacked and raped on February 22 while walking to her car outside Delta College in Bay City, Michigan.

She then spoke with police but told them she saw only her attacker's hands and had 'kind of blacked out' during the incident.

When police began to look into her claim, she said she wanted no part of the investigation and refused a physical examination, according to court documents seen by Michigan Live.

She reportedly went to campus the following day to tell college staff she had dropped her studies because of the rape, but it was later found she had in fact dropped the courses before reporting the rape.

Nearly a month later - after police had found no evidence suggesting there had been a rape in the campus parking lot - Zolkowski told university staff she had actually been raped by a friend in an apartment elsewhere while drunk and unable to consent before driving to the college.

Court documents show she apologized and stressed that she did not want the man to be charged.

But when the man was interviewed by police, records show he said Zolkowski had previously told him she was trying to get her fees refunded by Delta.

He also showed them text messages from Zolkowski in which she claimed she had been raped outside a Walmart store on February 22, the same night she claimed she was raped in Delta parking lot.

Pictured: One of the buildings at Delta College in Bay City, Michigan

In May, it emerged the woman had spoken to Saginaw Township Police Department to claim the man she previously said she had sex with while intoxicated had in fact thrown her to the floor and raped her.

But she again modified her claim, according to records, to state that she had consented to sex but had intended to tell the man to stop.

She added, however, that the sex was over before she had the opportunity to do so.

She has now been charged with one count of falsely reporting a felony and could be punished with four years in jail and a fine of $2,000 after appearing at Bay County District Court.

Zolkowski will next appear in court on August 29.