She authored books as Lauren Stratford alleging Satanic ritual abuse (SRA), and later assumed the guise of a Holocaust survivor as Laura Grabowski.
[5] An investigation by Bob and Gretchen Passantino and Jon Trott in the Christian magazine Cornerstone discovered Stratford's real name and family background, and that her stories of abuse were false.
[2] She attracted the attention and sympathy of evangelical author Johanna Michaelsen, one of the most influential promoters of the Satanic moral panic of the period.
While living with Michaelsen, Willson falsely claimed to have given birth to three children as a result of rape; two were allegedly killed in snuff films, and the third was supposedly sacrificed in her presence at a Satanic ritual.
[8] Cornerstone found no evidence that she had ever been pregnant or adopted a child, and when initially posed questions to her publisher, were told that they had documentation to prove the claims.
[11] She claimed to be a victim of the infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele, alleging experiments had rendered her infertile and the chemical injections blinded her eyes irrevocably.
[1] Willson befriended Binjamin Wilkomirski, claiming to remember him from the camps, even going so far as to go on lecture engagements together to recount their story.
[12] Wilkomirski (real name Bruno Grosjean) later was revealed to be neither Jewish nor a Holocaust survivor, aiding in the exposure of Willson as a fraud.