her character. you know, who she is. >> reporter: but she never existed. a fact first reported by the website deadspin.com. >> it was a story unimaginable and here was someone to say check because he heard she exist. >> reporter: the story of the doomed girlfriend formed a plot line told by te'o and the family. in an october newspaper story, the father said they locked eyes after a notre dame game at stanford in 2009 and then the near fatal car crash last year, subsequent leukemia diagnosis and death hours after his grandmother died. >> she would talk about my grandmother. trying to console me and i was just out of it. and last thing she said to me was, i love. >> >> reporter: te'o in florida preparing for the nfl draft issued a statement saying they met online and only communicated by phone. to realize that i was the victim of what was apparently someone's