One-man fraud squad
This FBI G-man takes down bogus Marines and fake heroes
By Laura Bailey
Times staff
writer
Making a bust was the
furthest
thing from Thomas A. Cottone Jr.'s mind as he paid his respects at a
Marine
officer's funeral this spring. But when the FBI special agent saw a man
there
he believed was breaking a federal law, he couldn't resist reaching for
his
badge.
In a
sea of mourners and squared-away leathernecks, 58-year-old Walter K.
Carlson
was one awkward-looking Marine. His dress-blue jacket belt struggled
over his
plump belly. Tufts of puffy, unshorn silver hair poked out of his white
barracks
cover. The captain's bars on his shoulders seemed out of place for a
man his
age, especially given the extraordinary collection of decorations he
wore.
Cottone
couldn't help but notice when Carlson slipped into the funeral service
for 2nd
Lt. John Thomas Wroblewski in Washington Township, N.J., then strode to
the
front of the pews and plopped down uninvited among the pallbearers and
family
members.
Something
about Carlson didn't add up. At the first strains of the Marines' Hymn,
he was
the only Marine who didn't snap to attention.
But
what really struck Cottone was Carlson's chest of medals. Among his
seven rows
of ribbons were a Navy Cross, two Silver Stars, multiple Bronze Stars
and three
Purple Hearts. And then there were the scuba bubble, gold jump wings
and
distinguished shooting badge.
"I
got whiplash once I saw what this guy was wearing," Cottone said. "It
was just too much. I strongly suspected this guy was bad."
Cottone
would know. Since stumbling upon a medals fraud case a decade ago and
befriending
a legendary leatherneck Medal of Honor recipient, Cottone has made a
cottage
industry of catching phony service members, wannabe war heroes and
medal
traffickers.
He is
the FBI's lead man on medals fraud cases. And when he saw Carlson at
the funeral,
he had to act.
The
price of faking
The
West Paterson, N.J., agent spends most of his time on violent crime
cases and
is involved in some antiterrorism work that occasionally takes him to
the
Middle East, but busting phony war heroes is where he gets his kicks.
"I
do it because it is a federal law, but this is one federal law I truly
enjoy
enforcing," he said.
With a
father who was a World War II combat veteran, Cottone is passionate
about the
value of awards -- all one needs to do to get a rise out of the
otherwise
cool-tempered agent is imply that impersonating a veteran is a
victimless
crime.
"This
is as much a theft as any other fraud and theft," he said. "These
people are literally stealing the recognition of those who legitimately
earned
these awards. It's illegal, and it's disgraceful. These people are
criminals."
Not
only is it against the law to impersonate a military officer, but it's
also
illegal to wear, sell or manufacture valor awards without permission.
But
these laws weren't widely enforced until a legendary Marine, retired
Col.
Mitchell Paige, a Medal of Honor recipient and World War II veteran,
pushed
Congress in 1994 to toughen laws governing illegal wear and sale of the
Medal
of Honor.
Before
that, a $250 fine wasn't enough to deter traffickers from selling the
medals,
which could net up to several thousand dollars depending on the medal's
history. But at Paige's urging, the laws were changed to include up to
a year
in jail and a $100,000 fine for individuals and $200,000 for
corporations for
wearing, selling or manufacturing the Medal of Honor illegally.
Busting
those who break these laws is a small part of his FBI work, but Cottone
has
nailed more than 100 people in the past decade.
At the
funeral, he added Carlson to his list. As it turned out, Carlson was a
bus
dispatcher who never served but was living the Marine image to the
hilt,
Cottone said, periodically dressing up and sneaking into such events as
the
annual Marine Corps birthday ball, telling people he served three tours
in Vietnam
with the 1st Reconnaissance Marines. With membership cards for
veterans'
organizations, including the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Marine
Corps
League, and a Marine Corps license plate on his SUV, it wasn't hard to
fool the
untrained eye.
Cottone,
55, stumbled upon Carlson by sheer coincidence, but he was no less
enthusiastic
about the arrest he made after luring Carlson out to the church parking
lot.
Carlson
is seeking acceptance into a pretrial probation program, Cottone said,
noting
that to be accepted is a tacit admission of guilt.
Why
they pretend
At 5
feet 6 inches tall, Cottone pushed his way into the FBI 37 years ago at
a time
when the bureau had a minimum height requirement of 5 feet 7 inches.
Since
then, high-profile cases have dominated much of his work, including the
kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and
the 1992
murder of former Exxon executive Sidney J. Reso.
But he
was hooked after his first medals case in 1995, when he busted a man
for
illegally selling Medals of Honor. Since then, he has dedicated part of
his
work to investigating the phonies -- and he's learned a lot about
pretenders
and why they do what they do.
Cottone
said war hero impostors are often regular Joes, low on self-esteem.
They often
dress up as service members and attend such events as Veterans Day
parades or
other veteran functions to somehow earn respect or live the lives they
never
led.
He has
outed all types of impostors, from small-town celebrity war legends to
fakers
who try to blend in at military reunions to federal judges claiming to
be Medal
of Honor recipients. There are many common traits. For one, he said,
they will
talk to anyone who will listen to their pretend exploits.
"It's
like offering heroin to a junkie," he said.
And they
do it first and foremost for attention and glory.
"All
these guys, they get a psychological rush," he said. "Having people
looking at them, saying, 'Wow,' it gives them accomplishments they
never
had."
About
90 percent are prior or retired service members. They tend to lean
slightly
toward Marines. And they always tout the best résumés.
"Most
of the impostors, they're not happy with being a Medal of Honor
recipient,
they've got to be everything else, Rangers, SEALs ... If there were
just as
many Navy SEALs out there as there are guys out there saying they're
Navy
SEALs, we wouldn't have to have any Navy SEALs."
Impostors
know exactly what they're doing; they calculate, they deceive, they
steal the
honor of others, he said. Often, they even have their families fooled,
said
Cottone, who once put a stop to a military funeral for a deceased phony
veteran
only hours before the ceremony was to begin.
Many
use their status to gain access to things that otherwise would be
closed to
them. One impostor, for example, stated in his company brochure that he
was a
fighter pilot in Korea, with the aim of improving the company's image.
Some
are active-duty service members wearing medals they weren't authorized
to wear.
In fact, another of Cottone's busts that came by sheer chance involved
an
active-duty Navy captain.
In
October 2002, Cottone was made an "Honorary Marine" by
then-Commandant Gen. James Jones for his work in busting frauds.
And at
his own awards ceremony, Cottone spotted a phony.
Navy
Capt. Roger D. Edwards, who was also made an Honorary Marine at that
October
ceremony, had an impressive rack of ribbons that tripped Cottone's
trigger.
The
special agent enlisted the aid of another medals-fraud hunter, B.G.
"Jug" Burkett, who had heard about Edwards' possible fraud and
reported him to Navy leaders.
Soon
enough, the truth came out: The captain was wearing 11 decorations he
didn't
rate. He was convicted and sentenced to 115 days' confinement and
forfeiture of
a total of $7,500 in pay over three months.
Finding
a phony at his own ceremony was a kind of downer for Cottone. But with
a
lifelong interest in the Marine Corps -- his career choices were either
the FBI
or the Corps -- Cottone wears his title proudly despite the way the
ceremony
played out.
His
pride is evident in the small Marine Corps emblem which now adorns the
lapel of
his typical navy-blue suits.
Unique
partnership
Many
of Cottone's tips come from other watchdogs, especially the North
Carolina-based Congressional Medal of Honor Society. With only 130
recipients
still living, unfamiliar names are quickly recognized as impostors by
the
tightknit group.
Working
closely with the society, Cottone has busted an impostor at each of the
five
Medal of Honor recipient reunions he's attended over the past decade.
At one
such reunion in Missouri, the special agent caught a wheelchair-bound
man
posing as a medal recipient. When Cottone confronted him, the man got
out of
the wheelchair, packed it in his van and drove away, Cottone said.
The
reunions have also provided a venue for con men trying to scoop up
medals, a
highly sought-after collectors' item, Cottone said.
At one
reunion, a man wearing an Army uniform offered to replace a medal held
by
Charles E. Coolidge, a veteran of World War II, with a new, updated
medal. Coolidge
got his new medal, which turned out to be a fake, and the one he turned
over to
the con man was later found for sale at a pawn shop for $5,000.
It was
Medal of Honor sales that drew Cottone into his decadelong passion, in
fact. In
1995, he received a tip that a vendor at a gun show in New Jersey was
selling
two Medals of Honor.
"It
was by luck and by chance that I had the case referred," Cottone said.
In the
investigation into the vendor, Cottone called the Medal of Honor
Society for
help in verifying the authenticity of the medals. "That's when they
about
blew my ear off and said, 'It's about time,'." Cottone said.
The
phone call led to a years-long friendship and collaboration with
Mitchell
Paige. Before then, the retired colonel had been almost single-handedly
hunting
down and exposing phony war heroes.
"We
became best friends and partners [after] that first phone call,"
Cottone
said of the colonel, who died in November 2003 at the age of 85. Before
his
death, he tipped Cottone off to dozens of cases.
Cottone's
watershed case came in 1996, when he busted government contractor HLI
Lordship
Industries for manufacturing hundreds of extra medals and selling them
at gun
shows and flea markets.
The
company was eventually convicted in federal court of manufacturing 300
extra
Medals of Honor over the years; the medals it produced continue to pop
up on
impostors, Cottone said.
"Every
medal I've taken off the neck of these impostors has come from that
company," Cottone said.
A drop
in the bucket
Now,
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are spurring a new generation of
phonies.
Cottone
can't talk much about one case because the investigation is still
underway, but
at least one man is claiming to have received the Distinguished Service
Cross
for actions in Afghanistan.
As the
national case agent for medals fraud, Cottone follows up on many tips
or
assigns others, including Mike Sanborn, a former Marine captain working
in the
FBI's Phoenix office, to follow up on a tip.
Sanborn
says Cottone is the driving force behind medals arrests, but the cases
they
catch are just a drop in the bucket.
"They're
just the ones we know about," Sanborn said, noting that impostors are
"a dime a dozen. They're everywhere." The job, he says, could be full
time if they wanted it to be.
Cottone
said the Internet has helped make impostors easier to track, as many
Web sites
record the names of real Medal of Honor recipients and also spread the
word
about what is legal.
"Obviously
we don't get everyone, but you don't want to be the one who gets
caught,"
Cottone said.