Roy J. Scott
Phoney Vets Prosecuted - a must watch video!
Sentenced
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Investigation
exposes phony vets
06:00 PM PDT on Friday, August 31, 2007
On Friday,
They're preparing a first wave of prosecutions that may expose some
fake veterans.
The first one -- a petroleum industry consultant -- had his day in
court Friday.
71-year old Roy Scott pleaded guilty to charges he used an altered
military discharge certificate to obtain veterans benefits and
unlawfully wore
It is least the second time in his life the
The first time was his dishonorable discharged from the Marines --
decades ago.
"We take this very seriously and this truly dishonors the great
men and women of the
Scott admitted that he forged a military release form to show he'd
been honorably discharged and wounded in the Korean War.
The Veterans Administration denied his request for post traumatic
stress benefits in 1999, but didn't catch his fraudulent records. The
organization has paid him $22,000 in benefits since.
Scott admitted to accepting $22,000 in benefits he didn't earn.
He repaid the money to the VA with a check Friday.
Scott also admitted to posing as a Marine officer in at least one
local parade , where he wore combat medals he didn't earn -- like the
bronze star and Purple Heart.
The U.S. Attorney says Scott's case should serve as a warning.
"People who should wear these medals earned them. They are due
our respect and a fraud -- like this guy -- is not," Sullivan said.
Sources say a half dozen other cases could be charged by next month.
Scott was convicted in 1990 in
Prosecutors here haven't received the file yet -- and aren't sure
what that case was about.
It could be a factor when Scott is sentenced in November.
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| Joyce man pleads guilty to wrongly wearing military medals |
TACOMA - A Joyce man pleaded guilty in federal court on Friday to pretending he held military honors he didn't earn.
Roy J. Scott, 71, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to unlawfully wearing military medals and to using and possessing forged or altered military discharge papers.
Scott used his falsified discharge papers to join a local veterans group and to get from the Department of Veterans Affairs almost $22,000 in compensation and medical coverage, according to court documents.
On Friday, he paid back the VA with a check, according to KING-TV.
Phone calls to Scott's home and to Thomas Olmstead, his Poulsbo attorney, were not returned on Friday or Saturday.
Scott is slated to be sentenced on Nov. 30.
Local members of the Marine Corps League suspected that Scott's stories about fighting in the Korean War were false.
"His remembrance of Korea was a little strange in what he was reciting," said Terry Roth, a Korean War veteran living in Port Angeles.
"A quick check showed he would have been 14 [during the war]," Roth said.
"When you're telling sea stories to guys that were there, it's easy to pick up a fraud."
Roth, along with two other Port Angeles Korean War veterans - Don Clayton and Robert Mingram - raised their concerns about Scott to the local commandant of the Marine Corps League, Dan Abbott of Diamond Point, in June 2006.
Abbott, who is also the Judge Advocate General of the state branch of the Marine Corps League, called FBI Agent Tom Cottone, who began its investigation.
After simultaneous investigations by the state Marine Corps League and the FBI, Scott's membership in the Marine Corps League was revoked and he was charged on Aug. 24 in federal court.
Operation Stolen Valor
Since 1996, Cottone has successfully prosecuted more than 100 Medal of Honor impostors under the FBI's Operation Stolen Valor.
Abbott requested Scott's military records from the National Personnel Record Center.
They did not match the DD214 form that Scott had submitted to the league.
The DD214 form is the military's official discharge form.
It details personal information, decorations, rank and service.
"He's not who he says he is," Abbott said.
The DD214 form is never officially corrected or altered; if a mistake is made the form is destroyed and a new one is made, Abbott said.
But Scott's form showed three different styles of typewriting, indicating to Abbott that Scott had cut and pasted his information over someone else's form.
Abbott said he does not know whose form Scott copied over.
Scott's record
Scott's official military records showed that he was an enlisted Marine,
but that he did not enlist until Oct. 29, 1953, three months and two
days after the cease-fire was signed.
In November 1958, he was imprisoned in the brig at Camp Elliot in San
Diego for eight months,
He was given a bad conduct discharge in 1959, according to the records
acquired by Abbott.
Abbott did not know why Scott was imprisoned or why he received a bad
conduct discharge.
Scott told other veterans that he had seen action in Korea and had been
awarded a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star, Abbott said.
A wife of one of the concerned veterans took a photo of Scott wearing
medals and ribbons during the 2006 Memorial Day activities in Port
Angeles.
The photo was the basis of the charge of publicly wearing military
medals he had not earned.
Impersonating a decorated veteran is an offense that Abbott, Roth and
others take personally, and in 1996 the problem prompted a nation-wide
investigation of selling of military medals.
"I am a veteran who saw combat in Vietnam, and he takes . . . the
valor and legitimacy away," Abbott said.
"When you do this, and you do it publicly, you've also used this in
other things in your life," he said of Scott.
"If you're that way with us, and that way with the Veterans
Administration, you're gonna be like that with everyone else."
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Reporter Randy Trick can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at randy.trick@peninsuladailynews.com.
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| Marine imposter sentenced to four months of home confinement |
Peninsula Daily News
A Joyce man who had falsely claimed to be a wounded Marine veteran with a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star was sentenced to four months of home confinement on Friday.
Roy J. Scott, 71, was sentenced in federal court in Seattle.
"We hoping for something more severe," said Terry Roth, one of the veterans who had called for an investigation into Scott's past.
"House arrest and two year's probation is pretty light," the Port Angeles veteran said.
Before his sentencing on Friday, Scott broke down in tears before Magistrate Judge Mary Alice Theiler and asked that she allow him to continue his job on an oil platform off the coast of Africa.
The judge, however, stuck to the recommendations of prosecutors by ordering the home confinement and two years' probation.
Scott admitted that he had posed as a Marine major.
He claimed to have been wounded in combat in Korea, telling other veterans he had been awarded the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star, said Dan Abbott of Diamond Point, the local commandant of the Marine Corps League.
A telephone call to Scott's listed number asking for comment was returned with the message that no one by that name lived there.
Scott pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Tacoma in August to using an altered military discharge certificate to obtain Veterans Administration compensation and medical benefits and to unlawfully wearing military medals.
He paid back the VA $21,960 for medical benefits he did not deserve, writing a check for the amount after he made his plea, according to KING-TV.
Eight members of the Mt. Olympus Detachment of the Marine Corps League from Joyce, Port Angeles and Sequim traveled to Seattle in a borrowed van to attend Scott's sentencing on Friday, Roth said.
"We found this," Roth said. "We brought the charges. We wanted to see it through."
"Ray's an embarrassment and a fraud," he added.
"He said in court that he had apologized to all of the members of the military he had defrauded.
"He hasn't spoken to any of us - not one."
Roth, who served in the Marines from 1959 to 1961, was one of the local members of the Marine Corps League who suspected that Scott's stories about fighting in the Korean War were false.
"His remembrance of Korea was a little strange in what he was reciting," Roth said in September.
"A quick check showed he would have been 14 [during the war]."
The Rev. Chip Wright of the Olympic Unitarian-Universalist Fellowship, of which Scott was a member, said on Saturday, "My personal opinion is he is taking care of what he needs to care of and nobody's perfect. He hasn't sinned, I see people daily doing horrible, horrible things and it seems those don't do anything as bad get caught up in the system."
Roth and two other Port Angeles Korean War veterans - Don Clayton and Robert Mingram - told Abbott about their suspicions in June 2006.
Abbott, who is also the judge advocate general of the state branch of the Marine Corps League, called FBI Agent Tom Cottone, who began an investigation.
After simultaneous investigations by the state Marine Corps League and the FBI, Scott's membership in the Marine Corps League was revoked and he was charged on Aug. 24 in federal court.
Scott's military records show that he enlisted in the Marines on Oct. 29, 1953, three months and two days after the cease-fire was signed.
He was given a bad conduct discharge in 1959, according to the records acquired by Abbott.
Abbott did not know why Scott received a bad-conduct discharge.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.
