'Military officers' use stolen valor to make seductive Facebook contacts

Purple Heart is offered for valor, something some people steal

Carol Forsloff--Several times over the past few weeks I have been contacted by middle-aged men in officer's uniforms, complete with medals and paraphernalia and pictures attesting to high rank, which is likely another attempt to win over a woman's confidence fraudulently by using fake ID that could get the fellows prison terms.

The early news reported on The Today Show via Rossen Reports that men using military uniforms and wearing medals in the real world is a frequent occurrence in the confidence game about getting a woman's affection and more.  The more is often the money.


In my case, these were the salutations:"Hello, dear, how are you?" which has to be an unusual way to greet a Facebook user that includes on the home page a picture of the woman with her husband.  The greeter, however, was a man in uniform, with a flag draped in the back of the wall in front of his pose and medals on his chest.  After blocking him, however, I cannot show his picture.  It just might be helpful for the wife, girlfriend, mother or significant woman somewhere in the man's life to know just what the fellow is doing in all of his spare time.  For this is what the errant fellow wrote to me after that short introduction:Hello dear; how are You---? how is life over there? You look so nice here in your picture, actually seen your beauty nice appearance its seems You really enjoy your life over there, though we haven't know yet, but due to The feeling of friendship that's really impress me mostly in You, meanwhile take care! my pleasure to hear from you soon. have a nice day."

And the fellow who called himself Richard Ben (which may not be his name at all) is not the only one to have contacted me, as there was another attempt to get past this Facebook user just a few weeks ago from someone who called himself Harp Campbell Lowrey.  I blocked him too and now have found his account has been temporarily removed by Facebook until his identity is properly established.  This event was not surprising when the news of The Today Show offered the segment on fraud and solicitation being done by men posing to be officers.

The fact is you can buy the military clothes and all of the peripheral essentials that will make the women swoon and the other men envious.  Or perhaps that's what the perpetrators of fraud and abuse might think when they make their online purchases at places like this one here.  Those military uniforms are sold by trusting souls who accept the idea that the person may be ordering a copy of what they may have lost or that uniform that got torn up in the laundry, so now the owner wants another for those sentimental reasons.  But sentiment is not what drives the fraud guys who put on the uniform with intent only to deceive.

Online the case of Jonathan Wade Short who admitted impersonating a soldier, claiming to have won a Purple Heart for Valor, then bilking the unsuspecting woman he found and courted into giving him some money.  He pleaded guilty and spent one year in prison.  But Rossen Reports tells us there are many more men who are using the ploy to deceive others.

The Stolen Valor Act makes it a crime to fraudulently claim one has been given the Purple Heart or Silver Star in order to gain financially.

But the crime against the woman, and her broken heart, can surely be hurtful too.

And women who use social media these days, it appears, must be as careful as those who walk in unfamiliar places and look for signs of mischief for that mischief may be lurking just ahead in Facebook Friends requests.