Category: Phony soldiers

This fellow, Ronald Paul Montagna, was busted years ago at the old POW Network, and he’s decided that it’s safe to go back in the Stolen Valor waters down in South Florida, so you know motorcycles and a vest are involved;

Here are some of his claims – he was captured by the Cubans, President Johnson presented him with a 48-star US flag – even though the flag had 50 stars on it for Johnson’s entire tenure. I don’t even know about the “rang his own bell” thing.

Anyway, the Navy remembers his career differently;

Six months and a few days – what a stud!

NBC12 in Richmond, Virginia did a story on a local hobo, Henry Bauman, who was claiming to be a homeless Marine veteran in the picture above taken by a viewer. The news team confronted him and he denied ever claiming to be Marine, well, until they showed him the picture, then, well, you know, he wrote the sign wrong. Whatever that means.

It’s called stolen valor, pretending to be a proud member of an elite group of people, the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces.

Bauman has been in trouble with the law in the past and has a record of petty crimes.

But, there are two sides to every story.

After investigating the man’s claims, it was revealed the rest of Bauman’s sign was true. He did lose his home and car and he is currently living in a hotel in neighboring Petersburg with his girlfriend and their four-year-old daughter, who has a serious medical condition that will require another surgery.

His new sign is more accurate.

Well, I feel better already. Actually, I’ve never met a real homeless veteran. I’ve met plenty of homeless men who claimed to be veterans, but they don’t stand up to scrutiny. I’m sure they’re out there, but I haven’t met one.

I hope the news team checked on Bauman’s family. But rest assured he will never be out there claiming to be Marine;

As for Henry, he says he won’t be impersonating a Marine ever again.

“I promise, swear to God,” he said. “On my momma, and my momma died of Stage IV lung cancer, I’ll never put this on there again!”

Well, until the next time.

Someone sent us their work on this fellow, Craig Lee Carroll lately from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Folks in the Appomattox, Virginia area were curious about him ten years ago when he tried to join the VFW in the Virginia area, but he couldn’t produce a DD214 discharge certificate. Apparently, he’d been telling folks that, aside from being a Vietnam veteran and a former Marine, he was also a CIA agent, who, at the age of 68 was still involved in the Global War Against Terror.

Just last Veterans’ Day, he was still balancing balls on his nose for the local media;

Retired Lance Corporal in the Marines Craig Carroll served on the front lines in the Vietnam War. “You’re scared to death, you’re dealing with an unknown and once the shooting starts and all the chaos begins, all of a sudden I don’t hear anything. There’s no sound, everything is slow motion,” recalls Carroll of being in battle.

He operates the Gettysburg Militaria and Antiques to soothe the injuries of the Vietnam War.

Yeah, no. POW Network busted him ten years ago for lying. When that website came down, he thought it was safe to start telling his lies again, i suppose. But, nope, no military service anywhere;

Maybe he’ll stay busted this time.

The Keene, New Hampshire Sentinel reports on the day last January when Don Shipley visited their local VFW Post to visit with Gary Robert Lefebvre. You can watch the video is you have a subscription. Lefebvre had been going the secret squirrel SEAL route with a forged DD214 and a forged letter from a General that warned the VFW Post 799 membership from checking into his background because his DD214 was marked “Top Secret Category 6” along with his secret Navy Cross;

Lefebvre’s service record gives no indication he was ever a SEAL. The log makes no mention of his being in Grenada, but says he was in Italy in 1983.

Lefebvre said to Shipley that, to his knowledge, his records were sealed and classified.

Shipley said in his interview with The Sentinel that he can verify if someone was a Navy SEAL quickly through the Naval Special Warfare Archives, which is a database of everyone who ever completed SEAL training.

A common misconception that fake SEALs tell people is that their military status is classified, according to Shipley. But like voting records and other public documents, SEAL status is a public record, he said.

Davis sums it up in the video during his drive with Shipley to New Hampshire.

“What we have to explain to these people, there’s nothing secret about us,” he said. “Some of our ops are, but there’s no secret training, there’s no secret nothing. … The only thing that’s classified is some of the things we’ve done — but we’re not.”

In addition to checking the SEAL database, Shipley requested a copy of Lefebvre’s service record from the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis.

Like Shipley, The Sentinel asked for Lefebvre’s record from the center, and received a copy close to three months after the initial request.

Lefebvre’s file shows he served in the Navy, but not as a SEAL. He was an aviation boatswain’s mate (handling) 1st class and spent the majority of his service in Italy. The date he enlisted is recorded as Dec. 30, 1976.

The video ends with Don yanking the stickers and the SEAL paraphernalia off his car. You know, the secret squirrel BS doesn’t extend to bumper stickers, I guess.

The solution, for Lefebvre, of course, involves lawyers;

Months after being confronted by Shipley, Lefebvre maintained he served as a Navy SEAL.

“My wife and children, immediate family and those closest to me know the truthfulness of my naval service,” he said in a phone message for The Sentinel. “The video was a well-orchestrated thing to accomplish a certain goal. They had no interest in finding out the truth or hearing anything.”

He said in the message that his attorney was working on filing criminal charges and lawsuits against Shipley and the VFW post in Keene and he wouldn’t answer any questions about what happened in the video.

“My attorney has advised me just let it play out,” Lefebvre said. “We know what we have for information and what we’re gonna work with. Then, when it’s all said and done, I will be vindicated.”

Our friends at Australia & New Zealand Military Imposters send us their work on this Noel Patrick “Molly” Muller fellow. I get the sense that he’s like some of our fat-mouthed creeps. He claimed to be a “Naval Diver” with scads of stories about his derring-do, but he was, in fact, a “visual signaler” in the Navy. He was diagnosed as being color-blind, so after the Royal Australian Navy offered to retrain him (a “visual signaler” who is color blind is of little use, I suppose) he refused it and they put him out. Now, he is fond of claiming that the Veterans’ Affairs folks don’t take care of him.

At the link are quite a few emails that he’s sent folks with stories of his escapades of fighting off enemy divers armed only with knife. He claims that he fought off Communists in Malaysia, Borneo and Vietnam.

His only “fight” in Malaysia and Borneo was his mythical “beach landing” and he may have seen Vietnam as a very distant smudge on the horizon because his connection with that theatre was aboard HMAS Melbourne that bobbed around the ocean up to 185 kms kilometres from the Vietnam coast between the 25th April and 5th May 1966. The history of HMAS Melbourne clearly states that never in its twenty seven year history fired a shot in anger or engaged and enemy. Muller’s only “fighting action” may have been attending action stations during training exercises. Muller had the temerity to liken his Vietnam service to that of a well know decorated ex soldier who completed a full tour in Vietnam with an Infantry Battalion.

He also relies heavily on bullying to garner sympathy;

I spoke to him, and asked him to put his complaint in writing to me, and I will investigate the matter and get back to him with a written response. He was not happy with that, and he then proceeded to abuse me. I told him to settle down and stop abusing me or I would hang up on him. He kept abusing me and so, I hung up on him.

He then made a direct formal complaint to the CEO complaining that he was being discriminated against because he was a “War Veteran” who was suffering from PTSD. The CEO put the matter back into my lap.

When I called him and identified myself, (not mentioning my Infantry background), he told me that he felt as though I was personally discriminating against him because he was a War Veteran who had killed people, and that I, as a gutless representative of a Church based welfare organisation, was making sure he did not get, what he felt was a fair go.

I explained that I was bound to offer him every assistance regardless of his background. He said that “we had spineless swine like you protesting against us when we were in Vietnam”, and that, “If I had had the Guts to have enlisted, rather than being an Anti War Protester”, I might understand him a bit better.

Apparently, there’s an Australian version of the Dutch Rudder Club;

The proven liar Noel “Molly” P Muller ex Royal Australian Navy now from South Australia has raised his head again condemning those who won’t give him a Totally and Permanently Incapacitated (TPI) Special Rate Pension.

Muller has more front than Myers. He claims he is mentally unwell. That is now a common catch cry of the Mad Galah brigade of which Muller is a member, he plays with that group because they support, and aid and abet wannabes and frauds. The problem with Muller is that he presented a folio of lies to The Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) in his attempt to get Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome recognized as being an injury caused by his war service. The problem is his “war service” was a pack of childish lies, he knows it, Department of Veterans Affairs knows it, and we know it but Muller refuses to shut up about it.

Muller is not mentally ill, he is a bullying, lying fraud who should be charged by law enforcement agencies for making false declarations.

I guess it’s the same everywhere.

One of our Canadian friends send us a link about Clayton Donoghue, a fellow up north who was busted for wearing unauthorized awards and for having child filth;

Orillia OPP received a complaint Monday regarding an individual attending local parades sponsored by the [Royal Canadian Legion] wearing medals not awarded to him.

As a result, the Orillia OPP Street Crime Unit arrested 62-year-old Clayton Donoghue.

Police also executed a search warrant at Donoghue’s Mooney Crescent residence and his business. Several items were seized that had been worn by the accused while attending public parades and events, police said, adding they also located items related to accessing and possessing child pornography.

[…]

It is not illegal to own military uniforms and medals, police explained, but it is illegal to wear medals or marks one is not entitled to in public, where it can be seen as posing as military personnel.

Like I’ve said, stolen valor is the warning flare for prosecutors. They’re all guilty of something else besides appropriating awards and decorations they didn’t earn.

From CTV;

[Ontario Provincial Police] say Clayton Donoghue faces a total of 10 charges that include using a forged document, unlawful use of a military uniform, obstructing a public officer, and two charges related to child pornography.