Alien abduction hoaxes

The Cergy-Pontoise case (1979)

The events that constitute what is now termed the Cergy-Pontoise Hoax began as report of a UFO abduction and climaxed with one of the spectators at the abduction channeling messages from the extraterrestrials whom he claimed were involved in the taking of his friend. On the morning of November 26, 1979, Jean-Pierre Prevost of the Paris suburb of Pont-oise called the police to report that his friend Franck Fontaine had been abducted by aliens. According to the story, the pair, along with two other men, were preparing to drive to a nearby town to sell clothes at an open-air market. Fontaine, their driver, sat inside the car while the others went to gather their stock. A UFO appeared and Fontaine was taken from the car. As the men watched, it sped away in the sky. Fontaine reappeared a week later. He claimed to remember little of what had happened. He fell asleep at the wheel of the car and woke up in a cabbage field, unaware that a week had passed.

After Fontaine reappeared, the police investigation of the incident intensified and Groupe d'Etudes des Phénomènes Aérospatieux Non Indentifiés (GEPAN), France's main UFO investigation organization, joined the search for the truth. After interviewing the principals several times and looking for any collaborating evidence, GEPAN concluded that the incident was without any value in furthering knowledge of UFOs, a kind way of saying that they had concluded that it was a hoax.

Three years later, one of the three people named Jean-Pierre Prévot made a statement:

"I declare that the Cergy-Pontoise case is a fake story from the beginning to the end. I am responsible for everything. It's me who have all organized, all created. I can prove it. Franck Fontaine has lived the 8 days of his abduction in the appartment of a friend, at Pontoise; it's me who have lead him there, and it's me who have bring him back. How can one imagine that aliens come to abduct such a fool?"