Viral ‘Brick Lady’ Accused of Fabricating Attack Claims for GoFundMe Scam

A woman who went viral as the “Brick Lady” after claiming she was attacked by a brick-wielding man outside a Houston club is now facing felony charges for allegedly concocting the entire incident out of whole cloth—and fraudulently raising more than $40,000 in the aftermath.

Roda Osman, 33, is facing one count of theft by deception, according to a criminal complaint filed in Harris County District Court, an offense carrying up to 10 years in prison. A police detective’s affidavit filed with the complaint says Osman raised money off another phony assault claim in 2020, “with the same narrative of a ‘black man hitting her,’” which investigators say also never happened.

On Thursday, Osman, a first-generation Somali-American doctoral student at the University of Texas, insisted it was all true—and claimed Houston police are simply retaliating against her for demanding the arrest of her supposed attacker.

“They’re trying to act like there’s a quota on how many times you can be assaulted,” an agitated Osman told The Daily Beast. “It’s like you can only be assaulted once every five years. Yes, I was assaulted in 2020, and there’s proof of that… They’re saying, ‘Oh she got attacked in 2020, and now she says she got attacked again, so she must be lying.”

Police say Osman’s story doesn’t add up and is contradicted by evidence including security video. To that, Osman said, “A victim who gets hit over the head shouldn’t have to remember all the details.”

“Nobody seems to have any empathy for me,” she said. “I was assaulted, I was treated for a concussion, I am suffering panic attacks… All that should matter is that a man assaulted me with a deadly weapon.”

Investigators, however, tell a very different story.

On the night of Sept. 3, Houston police responded to a report of an aggravated assault in the city’s Larchmont section, according to the affidavit. When officers arrived, they found Osman “intoxicated, hostile, and irate,” it says. Osman, who was with a friend, told the cops that she had been walking down the street when “an unknown male threw a brick at her when she would not give him her phone number,” the affidavit goes on.

“Osman also stated she ordered an Uber and thought the male suspect was the Uber driver and got in the car with him, then he tried to kidnap her,” the affidavit says. “... Osman stated the suspect was involved in human trafficking and had a large group of females in the car with him.”

A detective spoke to a friend who was with Osman the night of the alleged assault. She said the two had gone clubhopping, starting at the Liquid Lounge, then on to the O2 Lounge, but that they didn’t really like the place so Osman called some male friends to pick them up. The friends arrived in a dark sedan, and Osman got in the back seat, according to the affidavit. Out of nowhere, Osman suddenly shouted, “Ouch, why’d you hit me?” the affidavit states, adding that the friend, who had been sitting in the front, said she hadn’t heard any arguing behind her.

The friend said “she did not believe Defendant Osman was hit with a brick,” according to the affidavit. It says she told the detective that the alleged perpetrator then got out of the car, got into another, and drove off. Osman immediately went live on Instagram, and the friend had to convince her to call the police, the affidavit says.

When a detective spoke to Osman, she told him she called not her friends but an Uber to pick them up at the Liquid Lounge, according to the affidavit. When she got into the car, “the male then hit her in the face with the brick,” it states. The detective asked where Osman’s friend was at the time, and Osman “became upset and stated she was far away from her, talking to another guy,” the affidavit goes on. “Defendant Osman then changed her story to say she was assaulted at the Liquid Lounge,” it says. “After further gathering information, Defendant Osman became even more upset and requested to speak with my supervisor.” She then hung up, according to the affidavit.

About three weeks after the alleged incident, the detective reviewed security camera footage from a neighboring business, the affidavit states. It says it showed Osman, her friend, and the man Osman later accused of the brick attack, walking into a lounge called the TikTalk Garden. At 5:30 a.m., they emerged and got into a white Maserati, according to the affidavit. Osman and the man then both stepped out of the car, seemingly arguing, when she suddenly “swung her right hand while holding an unknown object and hit [him] in the face,” the affidavit states. The man then swung a plastic water bottle at Osman, which appeared to strike her in the face, the affidavit says.

Osman got back into the Maserati as the man got into an Audi A3 and drove away, according to the affidavit. She then exited the Maserati and went live on Insta, claiming not only that she had been attacked with a brick, but that numerous men stood by during the incident and did nothing.

The next day, Osman’s GoFundMe campaign appeared online, “stating that she was attacked by a Black male as she was walking down the street because she declined to give him her phone number,” the affidavit states. She quickly raised $42,302, but, as the affidavit notes, “The GoFundMe account is currently frozen after several donators [sic] reported the posting as fraud.” (Houston police told Click2Houston, which first reported the charges against Osman, that the water bottle is what left a mark on Osman’s face, and that “it was mutual combat.”)

As the investigation continued, the affidavit says detectives got a call from Daphne Sutton, a TikToker and mental health advocate who calls herself “TheQueenofAccountability.” She told them she thought Osman was “conducting a scam because of a similar situation that occurred in Minneapolis in 2020,” and sent along the associated GoFundMe page, which the affidavit says contained “the same narrative of a ‘Black man hitting her.’”

“A young Black Muslim single mother was viciously assaulted by private security in Minneapolis, sustaining multiple facial contusions, a black eye, and injuries to her leg and back,” it said. “She needs an estimated 5,000 dollars to pay for medical bills, legal fees, a new phone and more. Please donate if able, support and share. Thank you!”

But Minneapolis police told Houston detectives that they had no record of Osman being assaulted in 2020, and that the last contact they had with her was a 2012 arrest for public lewdness and disorderly conduct. Osman’s former roommate also told investigators that Osman—whose 2020 GoFundMe campaign raised $4,850 before being shut down—had not been telling the truth about any of it. She told the Houston detectives that “at first they were cool, but that she discovered that Roda was scamming people and she wanted no part of it.”

Osman continued to stick to both stories on Thursday, doubling down on the brick narrative.

“I was assaulted on September 3,” she told The Daily Beast. “It was 4 a.m. and it was pitch-black and we were in a parking lot, and I got hit on the head. The only thing I saw on the floor was a brick, so that’s what I assumed I was hit with.”

Osman said she was later told the object was “a liquor bottle,” contradicting the surveillance video.

“But the issue now is that when I raised funds, my community came through for me,” Osman went on. “And then I started pressuring the Houston Police Department to press charges on this guy. But it seems like the police, in retaliation, decided to press charges on me because the weapon of choice was different. They decide to say, ‘It wasn’t a brick, it was a bottle, so we’re going to get her for fraud.’”

The supposed Minneapolis attack was also legit, Osman insisted, saying she had a police report, despite there being no record of one.

“Yes, I was assaulted in 2020… I was in Minneapolis doing field work,” she said. “It was a very high-strung time, around the time of George Floyd. This off-duty police officer was kicking Black people down the stairs, and I was filming it.”

Osman said GoFundMe’s decision to remove her fundraisers has “retraumatized” me.

“If they’re going to give me fraud, that means every victim who doesn’t remember every detail, exactly, can’t use GoFundMe. What are we supposed to do as Black women, wear GoPros to make sure we get every detail right?” she said.

In an email, a GoFundMe spokesperson said the company “has zero tolerance for the misuse of our platform and cooperates with law enforcement investigations of those accused of wrongdoing. The fundraiser has been removed from the platform, all donors have been refunded, and Roda Osman has been banned from using the platform for any future fundraisers.”

Although Osman has been charged, she has not yet been arrested and found out about the charges on social media, she said on Thursday.

She has been aware since the fall of the police investigation into her, but was charged now after continually blowing off meetings with detectives, according to Harris County chief cybercrime prosecutor Keith Houston. However, Osman told The Daily Beast on Thursday, “I’m going to go over there and take care of it today.” At the time of the supposed brick attack, Osman was free on bail stemming from a felony assault and domestic violence arrest in Steele County, Minnesota, according to a bail motion filed by Harris County prosecutors.

“I’m a Somali refugee, I worked really, really hard to get where I am,” Osman insisted. “I’m a PhD student, I have a literary agent, there’s no reason for me to do fraud or play games. For what? Why would I want this kind of drama? This has interrupted my life so badly, I was just trying to speak out about violence against women.”

Osman became more and more upset as she continued to describe her feelings, calling it “a sad day,” and blaming the bulk of her troubles on the online sleuths who triggered the accusations against her.“If they don’t hate me for being Black, they hate me for being Muslim,” she said. “If they don’t hate me for being Muslim, they hate me for being a woman. If they don’t hate me for being a woman, they hate me for being a refugee. This is their opportunity to destroy me.”