Picture this. . .

You are walking home one night from a drinking session with friends, when all of a sudden you are blindsided and knocked senseless by some guy on a bicycle. As you lay there, the guy on the bike jumps off and steals your wallet. When the police arrive, they mandhandle you into cuffs you and haul you off to the station, where they throw you into a cell for about 13 hours.

Sound too crazy to be true?

Well, that is exactly what happened recently to a Saitama, Japan man who was robbed of 80,000 yen and then arrested for robbery.

It seems that the 18-year-old boy who ran the man down was accompanied by his girlfriend, also 18, who lost her purse near the robbery scene. Afraid that police would be able to trace them based on the girl’s I.D., the pair went to a police box where they reported that a man had stolen the purse from her. They gave a description of their victim to the police, claiming he stole the purse.

Two officers who rushed to the scene found a man that matched the girl’s description, and interrogated him.

At around 12:45 a.m. on Thursday, officers took the man into custody after he gave them the purse and told them he picked it up near the scene. The girl then identified him as the robber.

Police held the man for 13 hours, until they were able to ascertain that the girl and her companion had made the whole thing up.

The police chief was apologetic about the mistake. “We believed the accusations without sufficiently checking them, and caused trouble to the man. We’ll take care to prevent a recurrence,” said Hisao Kato, head of Tokorozawa Police Station.

The young man and woman are now in police custody, charged with robbery, inflicting bodily injury, and filing a false accusation.