As for Whitton, he doesn't seem to have a job to come back to in Georgia.
Asked for comment on Officer Whitton, Clayton County, Ga., Chief of Police Jeffrey Turner, corrected FoxNews.com. "You mean ex-officer Whitton."
"As soon as we saw it was a hoax," Chief Turner explained, "I filed the paperwork to terminate his employment."
Turner said he hasn't heard from Whitton, and that he was mystified at the former officer's involvement in such a blatant scam.
"He was a real go-getter," Turner said, citing Whitton's wounding in the line of duty earlier this summer while apprehending a suspect who had allegedly shot a woman in the head. "For someone to do a complete three-sixty like that, I can't explain it."