Thread: Man guilty in assuming identity of senator's dead aide

Man guilty in assuming identity of senator's dead aide

Wanted to stay in U.S. for medical treatment, lawyer says

April 09, 2011|By Peter Hermann, The Baltimore Sun

When John Robert Skelton got caught last summer stealing the identity of a deceased aide to a United States senator, federal authorities called the crime "despicable," and a spokesman for U.S. Customs said the agency was pleased to end the charade.

But the suspect's lawyer calls his client's actions more tragic than criminal. He needed medical care to treat HIV that only doctors in America could provide, the attorney said, adding that Skelton did not use his false name to profit from the victim in any way.

Instead of pleading guilty to aggravated identity theft, which would have required the judge to imprison the 41-year-old for a minimum two years, prosecutors allowed him to admit to the lesser crime of making a false claim of American citizenship.

U.S. District Judge Richard D. Bennett sentenced Skelton March 11 to the time he had already served when he was detained in July — three days — and ordered him to go immediately from the courthouse to the airport and take the next flight back to his home country of Great Britain.

"This wasn't a situation where he intruded upon someone else's ongoing life and caused the kinds of problems that often accompany the use of someone's identity," said Joseph L. Evans, a federal public defender, noting that his client didn't take out a credit card or bank account using his assumed name.

Evans praised authorities for being "understanding" and said that "at the end of the day, because it was such an unusual situation, the judge I think quite reasonably thought it was appropriate for him to just go home. … He's a guy with a special medical condition that prompted him to take steps that almost anyone else would have done."

Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein said in an email that "the judge imposed a sentence that was within the range recommended by the federal sentencing guidelines. In imposing a sentence, it is appropriate to consider the defendant's motive and any loss to the victim."

The family of the man whose identity Skelton took and lived under for 16 years, Kurt Branham, could not be reached for comment. But Branham's sister, Rhonda Lee Bocook, said in July that Skelton's actions brought back a torrent of grief from her brother's death in 1994 at age 28.

Branham, who grew up in Kentucky, had worked as a legislative aide for Sen. Mitch McConnell on issues that included missing and abused children. A spokesman for McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, did not comment on the case.

http://oneoldvet.com/

http://articles.baltimoresun.com

"This wasn't a situation where he intruded upon someone else's ongoing life and caused the kinds of problems that often accompany the use of someone's identity," said Joseph L. Evans, a federal public defender, noting that his client didn't take out a credit card or bank account using his assumed name.

But he did intrude, upon the American taxpayers. Don't tell me they don't have HIV treatments in the UK. Pull the other leg.

Did he pay for this treatment or did we get stuck with the bill??

16 years?
Give me a break!
And someone in THIS country paid for all that health care.
And I'm with miguelina. Don't tell me the UK didn't have care for HIV patients. That was way before the liberals high-jacked the health care system.

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