In the University of Virginia "gang rape" story, the media rushed in and tried and convicted the wrongdoers. When Rolling Stone issued its apology for the Jackie story, managing editor Will Dana noted that Jackie "had spoken of the assault in campus forums."

Just because a victim tells his or her story over and over again, with all the sensational details, it doesn't make it true. Especially after Jackie's friends started noticing that the details were changing.

In the Erdely store about Billy Doe, the writer referred to the former altar boy as "a sweet, gentle kid with boyish good looks" who was "outgoing and well-liked" before the brutal attacks turned him into a sullen, drug-addicted loner.

In the Billy Doe case, what Erdely didn't know was that Billy had already told his story to the archdiocese, police, and a grand jury, and would subsequently retell it to two different juries in two criminal cases. And every time he told his story, the details kept changing.

In the case of the alleged University of Virginia gang rape, The Washington Post discovered that although the victim claimed she had endured three hours of rape, which supposedly left her blood-splattered and emotionally devastated, no event was held at the frat house the day of the alleged rape.

Jackie's defenders also reported that "key details of the attack" had changed over time and that they were not able to verify those details. For example, one alleged attacker belonged to a different fraternity. The fraternity also reviewed a roster of employees at the university's swimming pool and discovered it did not include a frat member cited by Jackie, or anybody else who matched the physical description that Jackie gave of one of her alleged assailants.

But when it comes to details that keep changing or don't add up, Billy's got Jackie beat by a long shot.

In the Billy Doe's case, Billy initially claimed that he was:

-- Anally raped for five hours by one priest in the sacristy and afterwards the padre threatened to kill him.

-- Punched in the head and knocked unconscious by another priest, after which Billy came to and found himself naked and tied up with altar sashes; after which he was anally raped so brutally he supposedly bled for a week.

-- Punched in the face by a school teacher and strangled with a seat belt before he was raped in the back seat of a car.

Then, Billy dropped all those details about anal rape, being punched in the head and knocked unconscious, being tied up with altar sashes, getting punched in the face and strangled with a seat belt. And he invented a whole new story about being forced to perform strip teases, oral sex and mutual masturbation with the same trio of assailants.

This was the story reported as gospel by the grand jury and Rolling Stone.

The details, however, kept changing. In the case of the school teacher, Billy gave three different locations for the alleged rape -- in the classroom, in the back seat of the teacher's car, and in a park.

You think the details in the Jackie story didn't add up? In Billy's case, the district attorney's own detectives discovered the following contradictions to the story reported by Rolling Stone:

-- Billy claimed the first priest who raped him attacked in the sacristy after an early morning Mass. His mother, however, who kept meticulous calendars chronicling the daily events of her two altar boy sons, never listed an early morning Mass for Billy during his entire fifth-grade year when the attack allegedly occurred.

-- Billy claimed the first priest attacked him as he was putting away wine in the sacristy. His older brother, however, also an altar boy and a sexton, told police [as did other witnesses including priests] that it was the duty of the sexton to put away the wine after Mass.

-- Billy claimed a second priest raped him when he was a fifth-grader putting away the bells after a bell choir concert at the church. Three of Billy's former teachers at St. Jerome's, including the church's longtime music director, however, told detectives that only eighth grade boys were allowed to become members of the bell choir maintenance crew. The reason why was simple: only eighth-grade boys were strong enough to lift 30-pound tables and carry bell cases that weighed more than 30 pounds. As a fifth-grader, Billy weighed only 63 pounds. The teachers' stories were backed up by the school's yearbooks. No fifth grader was a member of  the bell choir maintenance crew, nor any sixth or seventh grader.

-- Billy claimed the two priests who raped him used the code word of "sessions" to describe their sex parties with Billy. The D.A.'s detectives, however, found a far more likely origin for the use of word sessions. The detectives interviewed one of Billy's former drug counselors who told them that "sessions" was the term for one-on-one and group therapy with drug addicts like Billy. As a patient at 23 different drug rehabs, Billy would have been familiar with the lingo.

-- The grand jury report claimed that two books on sex abuse found under Billy's bed proved that when he was in high school student Billy was trying to come to terms with being attacked. Billy, however, told detectives that he kept the books under his bed because they had hard covers, which he used to crush Xanax capsules on before he snorted them. When the detectives checked the covers of the books they found numerous indentations. Another student told detectives that Billy stole the book from her locker.

In the Erdely article, however, no possible credibility issues or contradictions regarding Billy Doe are raised. At the time, there was a gag order in place, so neither the defendants or their lawyers or any prosecutors are quoted. The author, however, quotes a former priest, a seminarian who got kicked out for disciplinary reasons,  a former monk who treats abuser priests, a victim of sex abuse and a couple of former prosecutors who take turns teeing off on the church. It's completely one-sided.

In the Rolling Stone article, Erdely repeatedly quoted from the secret archive files formerly kept by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in a locked safe. The files, pried loose with search warrants, chronicled the secret history of four decades of sex abuse in the archdiocese involving 169 abuser priests and hundreds of child victims.

Not once in 45,000 pages, however, is there a single instance of a predator trusting another predator enough to share a victim.

The archive files did repeatedly describe persistent patterns of grooming behavior by predator priests, often plying future victims with gifts, attention and special privileges. Grooming behavior, however, is entirely absent from Billy's stories.

In the secret archive files, patient predators spent years building up trusting relationships with their victims, and often, their parents or relatives, so they can gain access to the victims. In the Billy Doe story, however, three predators who have no relationship with Billy or his family strike without warning.

In short, Billy's crazy stories defied logic, common sense, all the evidence gathered by the D.A.'s own detectives, and established patterns of abuse as laid out in the secret archive files. They were also riddled with endless contradictions. Yet, since Billy's story fit a media stereotype, innocent victims and predator priests, it was fit to print.

For more on my adventures trying to wake up the rest of the media about the Billy Doe story read this.