Ed Cameron; phony Marine/VFW post commander
EdUSMCLeg sends us a link to St. Petersburg’s Bay News 9 about Ed Cameron, who claimed to be a retired Marine Corps Major as well as being a Purple Heart recipient, and he told the story so well, he became the post commander of VFW Post 2420 for two years. They also put him in a mural on a bus honoring Purple Heart awardees (that’s him in the middle up top).
But suspicions arose when he didn’t take advantage of the Veterans Administration medical treatment when he became ill. So they sent off for his records and it turns out that he spent an entire three whole months in the Marines;
Eventually post leaders got a copy of Cameron’s discharge papers which show he was released from basic training after just three months.
“He never finished boot camp in the Marines. He was never overseas. He was a complete fake, a fraud and a disgrace to the United States military,” said Menard.
“I almost couldn’t believe they were telling us this,” said Ronald Paye, VFW 2420 Quarter Master.
VFW leaders said the Commander position is voluntary and unpaid so they have no idea what Cameron’s motivation was.
“I was totally shocked. He was so knowledgeable,” said VFW 2420 Vice-Commander Gene Anthony.
From Tampa Bay ABC News;
Menard said Cameron left the VFW post when other veterans got suspicious of his story. They believe he stole his dead father’s Purple Heart so he had something to show for it.
“If that doesn’t constitute fraud, I don’t know what does,” said Eugene Futlz, Lake Wales mayor and Vietnam vet. “It really just upsets me to hear that somebody is fraudulently out there claiming to be somebody that they’re not. And taking the attention off the people deserve that attention.”
Futlz said Cameron moved out of the area and now lives in Arizona.
Category: Phony soldiers
I will never understand the reason why frauds such as this do what they do. What a damn disgrace……..
Easy, attention if you see they mostly get decorations which mean not only valor but arise emotions within people, such as purple heart, and decorations with V for valor.
I’d bet if they started to do a psy profile on them, most of them will either be sociopaths (by trying to gain from it without remorse) or just have extremely low (like this dude, he didn’t get a cent out but he was loved and admired, which was tons for him I bet)
That’ll be my guess
COURT-MARTIAL Deserter BERGDAHL;
Another slap in the face to all Soldiers who served the USA honorably from Obama!
Obama welcomes POS deserter as “hero” after 6 Soldiers die in search for this POS who left his post. He was an ENEMY SYMPATHIZER…. I was in Afghanistan when this human excrement betrayed his fellow soldiers. He should be court martialed and hung by the neck until dead. Instead Obama and his gay rights cronies take turns going down on him and lauding him as a “Hero”
Kirjath D. Toney was unavailable for comment.
He should be called, “El Cabron.” 🙄
I hope he’s living in a single wide trailer with no air conditioning out in the middle of the AZ desert.
Ooopsydaisy…Dan Rather would be so damned proud…
Courage
“What’s the frequency, Kenneth?”
Since you asked – I think Greaseman was still on 101.1 when that came out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWkMhCLkVOg&feature=kp
.
And in case anyone doesn’t know the background and missed the Dan Rather connection:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#.22Kenneth.2C_what_is_the_frequency.3F.22
VFW doesn’t give a shit just as long as you pay the dues. If they did they’d do a FOIA at the national level when somebody new applies which they don’t. Instead they don’t do shit but waste money on stupid magazines and other crap leaving any verification to each local chapter that basically consists of any shitdick walking in with a piece of paper they can print out as proof of service.
True story…they were trying to recruit me as a VFW member and I told them I didn’t qualify as I had not been in a conflict area…they said don’t worry about it and tried to pigeonhole me….”Well weren’t you in Korea (yes less than 30 days and on leave not TDY)…I explained that I had orders for multiple deployments that could have been consider eligible but never set foot in theater Restore Hope, DS/DS etc.
That’s why I don’t have any respect for them any more.
/AL and DAV life member though.
It’s pretty much the fault of the post officers and district inspector. The quartermaster is required to have on file the DD214 of all post officers and the district inspector is supposed to verify that during his annual inspection of the post
I know, but verification goes beyond being handed a DD214 which anyone can just print out. The exact same meeting I gave them my DD214 I was voted in. There was no real verification and frankly you just can’t trust people any longer.
Like I said they spend buttloads of money on frivilous shit the least they can do is spend some on verification to protect their reputation and honor of their members from being exploited by phonies.
Sorry to hear that, but not all VFWs are so lax. I’m a life member and I had to provide a copy of my DD214. That’s the way it should be.
Awesome vetting by the local VFW post! Letting a Stolen Valor thief get this far at the local level and asswipe gets called out when he’s the Post Commander!
Someone at the State and/or National level needs to pull their head out of their rectum and say “We need to look at how we vet people looking to join!”
But that would take someone making a “command decision” in order for that to happen…
I did a little more than 3 months in the Army, but I still do not qualify for the V.F.W.. Yet I had someone tell me I could join, even after I told them I did not meet the qualifications.
We all see the result of that kind of thing above. I mean this guy had to be pulling off some majore league posing though to get to the level that he did. It still does not excuse the VFW for allowing him in to begin with. We all want to believe people though when they tell us they are a veteran. We all want to not have to question people on their Service.
but…
Just die you old fucking phony.
Jesus, how is it that the VFW gets fooled by so many phonies? Don’t they know what to look for or care?
Since the end of the draft in 72, there are far fewer veterans entering the civilian sector. Therefore VSOs have correspondingly fewer vets interested in joining. Consequently, VSOs are continually looking for anyone to join so they can keep their numbers (and membership dues) up.
Steer clear of AmVets, too. Went several times, one of the members tried jacking my ass up with bullshit stories. After I told him his super secret squirrel shit didn’t fly, he got pissed. THEN I politely informed him ANBD offered to put him in contact with this blog. Ain’t heard shit nor shinola out of him again.
Sheesh, can’t they just cut down their size until it’s proportional to the number of members they have, or maybe ask for donations just from the general public, or hold a barbecue or SOMETHING besides taking sketchy valor thieves, though? It just seems like there are so many options to stay alive that don’t involve letting shitbirds like this in.
Must come to the defense of my beloved VFW here, but not without some qualification. It is currently required that applicants submit supporting documentation of their qualification to belong. Is that systems being abused? Obviously.
Yes, absolutely, there should be more oversight. In the short term, I think that much would be accomplished by each post continuing to file DD-214’s on every new member without the added expense of doing a FOIA on every individual. BUT, absolutely, a FOIA should be immediately submitted on every prospective national, state and Post officer. After the announcement is made that this is what will happen henceforth, many, perhaps most, of the frauds will sort themselves out of the running.
It would surely serve all the service organizations to be more intentional in ridding themselves of the frauds. It is only hurting the organizations by allowing this trend to continue.
Great idea! But it will never happen since I would guess a lot of those in “power” now may be embarrassed if the truth got out lol. However, I would hope they would consider it in the future.
Similar to Congress voting on legislation regarding penalties for corruption while in office.
Fuck that jazz. All members should be verified. I highly doubt a one time small fee would be complained about to root out phonies in the organization and I believe based upon my experience of members being overwhelmingly charitable they’d have no problem paying for it.
Everyone in the organization represents it. Everyone should should be held accountable and verified otherwise what is the point of even having eligibility requirements to begin with if you basically show it doesn’t matter unless you’re elected.
The VFW is full of phonies. My guess is that this shit sandwhich recreates his persona in Arizona.
Thats why I dont go to the VFW, I am a life member but refuse to listen to all the BS stories. I dont think enough is done to vet these assholes !
Mega-Ditto.
My first year in the VFW was offered to me when I was mobilizing in Ft. Mcoy. There was this VFW table set up at the post exchange. Now then, this is the weird part. They offered me a free one year membership BEFORE I even set foot in the sandbox.
I simply asked the guys behind the table if it would be more appropriate if they were talk to me AFTER I redeployed. They told me that it did not matter.
Now the post I belong to has it’s act squared away. The Post commander(a retired CSM and Vietnam veteran) actually did a FOIA on me to verify my service after I redeployed and came back home.
They were doing the same thing at Camp Shelby in 2004. I had already deployed and was wearing my
shoulder sleeve insignia for former wartime servicecombat patch, so they signed me up right away. I get the magazine, but I have never participated in the local post.Moved to Arizona.
Bet they are excited.
Time for a BOLO here in AZ
He moved to AZ in a hurry, didn’t he? I hope he’s having to live in a tent or abandoned house!!
There’s a very simple way to fix this, and IMO all VSOs should adopt some variant of the following:
1. Stop accepting documents verifying military service or disability status directly from applicants.
2. Make the first year’s membership provisional, and contingent on receipt of documentation proving eligibility from official sources.
3. Have all provisional members sign a SF180 authorizing release of an unredacted copy of their DD214 to the VSO in question. (If necessary, have them file a similar release with the VA to ascertain status as a disabled vet.) The release doesn’t have to be total – just the info necessary to verify eligibility, most likely an unredacted DD214. The information should be sent directly to the VSO – not to the vet.
4. On receipt of the info from NPRC/DOD/VA, the vet – if qualified – is given full membership. If not qualified, the provisional member is released and the remaining portion of their first-year dues is refunded.
If a VSO was truly serious, this process would also be applied to all existing members on a one-time basis.
I’m guessing it won’t happen, though. Too big a chance for a rather large loss in membership if they do.
As a lifetime VFW and dues paying AL member, and frequent visitor to this site, I agree the VSO’s should do a better job vetting potential members. Lord only knows we have all read about the boatload of phony VFW post officers and members on this site (Bernath, I am looking at you). I would have no problem releasing my DD214 to anyone, but not without redacting my PII. Just like a VSO shouldn’t trust everyone, I trust no one with my PII and give it up very grudgingly because some people are identity thief assholes. I guess I shouldn’t complain about your idea though since I am at a loss to come up with a better idea.
Mel Shafer: I do indeed understand the privacy concern. However, I have to take issue with the “redacting my PII” part, for a couple of reasons:
1. PII includes your name, age, and address. I don’t see how any VSO is going to let someone join without asking for at least that much. So I don’t they’ll let you redact those from your documents proving eligibility. (smile)
2. VSO’s in general have requirements to prove service during specified periods or in specified locations/under specified conditions. The military used the SSN to track personnel records. Ergo, the VSO also needs the SSN to ensure that the documents provided to prove eligibility relate to the same individual that is applying.
3. Membership in any VSO is voluntary, and the organizations are non-governmental. Federal Privacy Act protections in general therefore do not apply.
There may be a way around providing at a minimum name and SSN to allow cross-matching of documents with applicants. But since the military used (and I believe still uses) SSN to track personnel records, if there is for the life of me I cannot figure out what that work-around would be.
The most important aspect of my proposal, however, is that VSOs must quit accepting applicant-provided documents, requiring instead these documents be send directly from official sources to the VSO. Fake documents are simply too easy to produce/obtain these days by someone with a bit of knowledge and/or $$$.
Sadly, I doubt any of the national VSOs will ever mandate this. Money talks; and IMO they’re all worried that if they get serious on this score, a fair chunk of their membership will be found to be non-qualified and will walk – along with their money.
Hondo – I’m with you on what you posted. But, this needs to be driven from the top down to the local level. If I remember, in the AL’s Burn Pit concerning “Gunny” Lauve, someone in the article stated something along the lines of “National does not want to dictate how this is done at the local level”. My impression is that all of the VSO’s know this is a problem, but don’t want to tell those at the state and local level to “get their shit together” and do it ($$$ is probably the main reason).
For anyone else out there – hat about coming up with a database or some other means of verifying what local chapters of a VSO are “running a tight ship” and ID’ing those that are playing “fast and loose” with membership?
Fully agree, HMCS(FMF) ret. But as I’ve said elsewhere – I’m not holding my breath.
I resigned from the AL because they took no action to remove this phony Mayor who had the post come out and vouch for him all the while knowing he was a total fraud. http://Www.johnspodofora.com
Post 511 in Manahawkin NJ is nothing more than a rats nest as they didn’t even have the balls to kick him out on their own.
I’m a life member of the VFW, I’m legitimately qualified, and no one has ever asked for any proof of service.
Yeah, that is a problem. Life member here as well, but I was asked to prove my eligibility.
Perhaps if some of us encourage our state and regional officers to lead by example we could start a trend. Yep, think I will work on some of the folks I know to do just that. If others would do the same, we might get some accountability going around the country.
Same here, granted at the time I was the only person in my small home town that had deployed so it was widely known that I was qualified.
What is it that everyone says around here? “Trust but verify.” Be nice if more organizations followed that advice.
One of the things about hanging out with Jonn’s Ninjas: I now turn a very suspicious eye on claimed military service, unless there’s some proof to back it up.
I’ve been turning somewhat cynical myself lately. Every time I’m behind a vehicle with some sort of military/veteran sticker on it I want to ask them for proof. I jumped out of my truck the other day at a stoplight to interogate a driver and before I could say anything he gave me $1 and told me not to spend it on booze….
Ran smack into a poser in front of a local grocery store a couple months ago (long grey hair and beard, wrinkled dress greens, medals from here to there — everyone here knows the type). I looked him up and down and started for him, when two very ripped young men reached him first, bracketed him, and started talking to him in a low tone – one in each ear. I watched for about a minute, then went into the store. When I came out, all three were gone.
To my everlasting shame, I didn’t have either my phone or my digital camera with me, otherwise I would have REALLY made a contribution to TAH!
That’ll be ten(10) old school pushup’s for not having yer camera with ya. 😎
PintoNag: doesn’t your cell phone have a camera?
Awesome.
But I guess the question is still out there: did you spend it on booze?!?!?
Damn right!
Question for all of you VFW members. How do you get into the VFW without proving you have active service in the area of conflict. As a veteran of the Vietnam era without actual VN service I was told that I was not eligible to join. The American Legion was the place for members without actual in country service. How does a guy with 90 days total service slip past the membership board? It seems to me that the board members bear some blame for this scammers actions.I served overseas during the conflict, unfortunately we were not at war with Japan at the time.
I really don’t know when they started requiring proof, Roger. I got the idea in the early 90’s that at the time, it was a fairly new requirement, or that it was a new priority. The Post where I applied thought it was a great idea, and complied willingly. At the time I had no reason to ask about it, and have only been around Posts that enjoy following the rules.
In other words, I simply do not know. The few Posts I have spent time around pretty much every new recruit knew someone and could self-vet, for all practical purposes. Have heard quite a few, “Oh, yeah, you left for basic right after you graduated, blah, blah, blah.” It’s an advantage of having neighborhood Posts, but the flipside is that frauds beget more frauds.
Is it just me, or am I seeing a argument on there that the VFW is filled with phonies while the Legion isn’t? Maybe I’m just reading too much into it. But that argument is like saying All Yankees fans are morons, while all Red Sox fans are Wicked Smaht(maybe TSO would say that). But the truth is there is good and bad on both sides. Let me first say I support both organizations. I’m a VFW life member, and I virtually grew up at my local Legion post where my father was a post commander. But each organization has been the victim of various frauds, not only the VFW. Simply google the name “George Lauve” and see the extent he conned the the Legion. I joined the VFW at my previous assignment. I’m still on active duty so I didn’t have a DD214, but I did have to provide a personnel RIP showing my deployments and campaign medals. I’m now stationed overseas, but my wife stayed CONUS to plant retirement roots. She went to transfer her Auxillary membership to her new local post, and even though we were both life members, the new post still asked for my credentials. Rather than be upset, we were both impressed that her new post wanted to verify themselves knowing that other posts don’t often verify service claims as they should. I don’t doubt there are VFW posts out there bending or breaking rules to pad their membership rolls. But it’s unfair to make a blanket accusation about an entire VSO based on the actions of selected irresponsible posts. Ultimately while too local VSO posts allow themselves to be conned, the real jerks are the posers taking advantage of those VSO’s. I suppose the only time I get “angry” at the local post is when instead of getting rid of an ID’d poser, they instead circle their wagons around the fraud. This was initially the case with some Legion members in the George Lauve incident. If folks want this to change, BE ACTIVE IN YOUR LOCAL POST. It’s so easy for vets to… Read more »
I think, since the dude had weaseled his way into the VFW, that’s what most people are talking about. A while back, when it was the Legion that had a couple phonies, they took the brunt of the criticism. It balances out.
They have all had their phonies i.e. Korean War Vets, Marine Corps League, VFW, American Legion, etc. This time, it’s on the VFW. Next time will probably be the Legion. Everyone gets a shot.
What do you folks think about the MOPH?
Curious?
Bunch of old dudes reliving the glory days drinking their older years away. My job with the VA right now involves helping Vets with substance abuse issues and most of the guys I met at MOPH should be in the groups I facilitate… As a young Vet, I thought the MOPH would be the best organization for me to get involved in but I was turned off to it after two meetings. There were quite a few reasons:
1. Didn’t really care to get involved with issues concerning OIF/OEF Vets. I was told “We are pushing Vietnam Vet issues now- you will get your turn.”
2. I was almost looked down upon because I only had 1 Purple Heart. The guys with 2+ acted like they were some sort of gods.
3. They didn’t care when I called one guy’s claims into question- he was a life member.
4. They had no desire to get involved in volunteer opportunities if it didn’t garner any attention from media/others.
5. They looked down on you if you weren’t 100% disabled. They sat around telling each other what to say/do to get their 100% from the VA and it made me sick. In the next breath, they would complain about welfare and other social programs. I got tired of the hypocrisy.
This was my experience at just a couple MOPH chapter meeting, but it was all I could take. There is a reason many younger Vets are shunning the organizations that have been around a while and these are a few of the reasons for me. I am sure other chapters are great, but I haven’t heard of one yet.
Interesting.
I’m sort of shaking my head here …
The Commander, the First Vice, and one of the Executive Board members of my first American Legion Post looked over all my documentation together. They went through it all. I had actually just come back from the DMV (getting disabled veteran plates) and had everything with me, including award letter from the VA. With each subsequent move every AL I’ve joined has taken my membership card at face value to let me enter, but have all looked over my documentation when I switched my membership to their post. I even keep dual membership as a Legionnaire and as a Son of the American Legion (under my father’s service) … it has come in handy when bridging the gap between the two when small conflicts arise.
My experience with the VFW has essentially been the same, and I hold a life membership in that organization. (I’ve not joined AmVets or any other veteran organizations.)
I have found that smaller posts (in both the AL and VFW) are a lot more lax than bigger posts, but still check stuff out.
Just my experience.
I will say, one thing that surprised me in Ohio was both the AL and VFW allowing what they call “social members” to join. These are people that are friends of regular members/ladies/sons and cannot join otherwise. They pay the same dues, and can come to every function, and can utilize the social quarters (including drinking and playing pull-tabs) but have no say or vote in how the organization is run.
It’s actually good for the club and good for the people … especially where I live now. There are five bars in my town, the VFW, the AL, and three shitty, dealer infested rat holes. The people who don’t wish to associate with the three dives and their clientele join the VFW and AL as social members. It works out pretty well.
Most all AL and VFW Posts in my state are open to the general public, when it comes to the bar and some social functions, however, we do not allow “social members” and all official functions are members only. Having the bar/pull tabs open to the general public is pretty much the only way that Posts with bars survive. I know that there is no requirement for a Post to have a Post Home, but it is nice to have a bar where you know you can go that isn’t a dive or a dance club. Unfortunately, that’s one of the reasons you aren’t getting the younger members, also; you don’t cater to the dance club atmosphere, so you don’t get the younger Vets. It really is a double edged sword.
I do know of one Post that is a members only AL Post (at least it was about 10 years ago) in Lincoln Nebraska and they have a bar-dining room that does quite well. however, that is an exception, not the rule, which is sad that more Posts don’t get the support from the membership like that.