Category: Stolen Valor Act

You probably remember Sean Yetman who was exposed as a phony in a Philadelphia mall by Ryan Berk a few months ago on Black Friday. Mr. Berk was honored by his local Marine Corps League post for bringing attention to the issue of stolen valor, according to the Intelligencer;

Berk, a criminal justice major at Temple University who in November confronted a man who was dressed as a soldier but had not served in the military, was presented with the Distinguished Service Award by the Marine group.

In presenting the award, Richard Weaver said the honor was given in recognition of Berk “raising public awareness to the issue of stolen valor in our society.”

I’ll admit that Berk has indeed succeeded in making the whole stolen valor thing part of the public discourse. I imagine that since he took the video of Yetman, it’s a lot harder for the phonies to go out in their phony finery and not be confronted.

Jeff Rosen reported this morning on stolen valor on NBC’s The Today Show and, of course, the report features our buddy Don Shipley. The report is mainly about Jonathon Short who defrauded a woman by convincing her that he was a wounded veteran who needed money to take care of a non-existent child.

I wonder how this report will affect the Brian Williams legacy. I particularly like the fellow with an ROTC Cadet Command combat patch. He definitely wasn’t putting forth the effort that he should.

Regular readers here will remember how Nate Fornwalt cheated Matthew Ott out of $2000 that Matt had raised to help veterans. Fornwalt had woven a tale about his exploits in the Marines that tugged at Matt’s heart strings, but those tales were all false. When Fornwalt wouldn’t return the money to Matt, TAH raised another $2000 for Matt. Well, Matt’s dad, John Ott, also a veteran got angry about Stolen Valor and started to influence his local legislators to write a Stolen Valor law for Pennsylvania. From CBS21;

John said he wants to push forward the state bill for every Purple Heart recipient and others who received high military honors. He says he will become the face behind this bill to make it a misdemeanor if a person misrepresents military heroics. “You need to understand and realize that if you steal valor you will not get away with it,” said John. Senate Bill 43 would make it a summary offense to wear improper insignia for the gain of profit, or a misdemeanor of the second degree for misrepresenting top military medals.

The news folks tried to talk to Nate Fornwalt, but he closed the door in their faces;

John called today and said that the Pennsylvania Stolen Valor Act is scheduled for a vote later this month.

New Jersey 101.5 reports that new legislation is being presented in the New Jersey legislature this year. I call it the “Ron Mailahn Attitude Adjustment Act”

The legislation would make it a third-degree crime for anyone to knowingly misrepresent themselves as a member of the military — for the purpose of obtaining money, property or another benefit — by wearing the uniform, or any medal or insignia, authorized for use by the members or veterans of the U.S. Military. Anyone convicted of such a crime would be fined a mandatory minimum of $1,000.

“They’re going to be fined, and also, it’s going to be able to help other families going forward,” Mazzeo said.

Any fines collected under Mazzeo’s bill would be dedicated to the Military Dependents Scholarship Fund, which would be established by two bills currently pending in the state legislature. The fund would provide college scholarships to the spouses and children of those killed, missing in action or disabled in Operation Noble Eagle, Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom, or Operation New Dawn.

Good thing you’ve already been busted, huh, Ron? We saved you from getting arrested. But we still have that den of thieves up there who like to troll here sometimes and then there’s always Snake Eyes Jordan – he’s from new Jersey, right? I think Jonathon Sharkey ran for governor of New Jersey once, too. So, Lord knows there are enough up there to keep prosecutors busy – but will they? Prosecute, I mean. We know politicians love to write these laws, but they don’t get enforced.

Military.com reports that legislation in Congress may make the award of Combat Action Badge retroactive to soldiers serving as long ago as the Second World War;

The Combat Action Badge, authorized for soldiers in combat who are not eligible for the Combat Infantryman Badge or Combat Medical Badge, was established in 2005 to recognize that many troops – regardless of their specialty – were coming under fire and engaging the enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Rep. Richard Nugent, R-Florida, has filed legislation for retroactive CAB authorization for several years, even making it tax-neutral by requiring those who might be approved for the medal to purchase it directly from the supplier.

The House adopted his bills but the Senate has balked.

“I’ve never gotten a good explanation for why the Senate is so opposed to it. There is no cost to the taxpayer associated with the badge and these men and women have clearly earned the recognition,” Nugent said Thursday.

Well, first of all, Representative Nugent, the CAB is one of those badges covered by the Stolen Valor Act of 2013, meaning that someone wearing it without earning it is subject to prosecution. Secondly, the award of the badge is pretty specific;

Specific Eligibility Requirements:

May be awarded to any soldier.
Soldier must be performing assigned duties in an area where hostile fire pay or imminent danger pay is authorized.
Soldier must be personally present and actively engaging or being engaged by the enemy, and performing satisfactorily in accordance with the prescribed rules of engagement.
Soldier must not be assigned/attached to a unit that would qualify the soldier for the CIB/CMB.

Can you imagine the documentation that would appear, mostly from badge-hunters, to prove that they were “actively engaging or being engaged by the enemy”, from, say, the Korean War? Representative Nugent claims that there is no expense to the taxpayer involved – but who is going to do the research necessary to approve the potentially millions of awards and verify that only eligible applicants will get the award? Not to mention the other millions of phonies who will wear it like they wear the 3rd award of the CIB now, with no fear of being prosecuted, even though it’s illegal.

It will only serve to dilute the symbolism and meaning of the award, and it’s phony bait – as evidenced by the photo above that I scraped from somewhere on the internet.

You probably remember valor thief Dennis Meyers who created a Silver Star citation, haffassedly, and convinced phony Vietnam veteran Tom Harkin to send a staffer to award it to him in a public ceremony. Here’s his poorly-crafted citation;

Pretty damn sad isn’t it? Well, we just heard from our buddy, Doug Sterner that the reporter who wrote the original story called and told him that Myers doesn’t face any charges for his deceit. The American War Library still sells those sorry excuses for a citation. The only thing that has changed is that Harkin is out after this Congress.

This all begs the question why have Stolen Valor laws when no one intends to enforce them? You could ask the same of most laws these days. We have laws for everything these days and most of them are written by folks who want to get reelected. I was shocked to find that there are federal breast-feeding laws. The Federal Trade Commission regulates the size of theater seats. And don’t get me started on guns laws. We all know how guns laws are written with fan-fare and celebration but they never get used to actually prevent gun crimes.

The latest Stolen Valor Act was approved last year with some celebration and photo events at the White House. But no one has been prosecuted under he Act to this date. The actual stolen valor itself has exploded. We’ve had nearly 200 cases added to our Stolen Valor page since March. We’ve discovered people who are stealing from the Veterans’ Administration, pretending to be POWs, wearing nearly every valor medal without earning them, wearing combat badges. The justice system is broken.

Legislators write laws that make them look good and prosecutors won’t pursue those cases because it doesn’t make them look good enough. In Pennsylvania, a legislator tries to write a new law the restricts sales of valor goods. Let’s say that works, does anyone think that a prosecutor will really go after dealers? Are prosecutors going to monitor Ebay?

So, that leaves enforcement of stolen valor to the shame of the village square – TAH, Guardian of Valor, Scotty and the countless others who have set up websites across the internet. But then, who protects us? You’ve all heard and read the death threats, the crappy law suits that get filed against us. You know, things that the justice system and law enforcement is supposed to protect law abiding citizens from – folks who are engaged in legal businesses and work within the law.

I’m not asking for new laws, I’m just asking for the so-called justice system to enforce the laws they already have on the books – all of the laws, all of the time. You know – that whole protect and serve thing, I hear so much about. If you’re not going to do that, don’t be surprised when there are a pile of bullet-riddled bodies at the end of my sidewalk some night when one of these goofballs decides to follow through because he gets the impression that the laws don’t apply to him, because they haven’t so far.