Gary Lakis; phony Marine contractor

Scotty sends us a link to his work on Gary Lakis, who built himself a great story that a lot of people, including the US government swallowed hook, line and sinker. ABC News did an article on Lakis fooling folks back in 2004;

But for all his talk, some of his own employees soon became suspicious that Lakis was a phony.

“He was my boss,” said Sweeney. “We had all pretty much heard about his qualifications and I was fairly embarrassed by his performance.”

ABC News has learned there is no record of combat during Lakis’ 10 years of active and reserve duty: no special operations, no Silver Stars, no Bronze Stars, and no Purple Hearts.

A group of Marine veterans questioned the huge number of decorations Lakis wore to a Marine veterans reunion where he even posed for pictures with the then-Marine commandant, Gen. James Jones.

“All he was, was nothing but a dirty liar and a phony. That’s all he turned out to be,” said Dick Sasser, a former Marine veteran who was a member of the Marines’ elite special operations unit called Force Reconaissance.

According to the ABC News report, Lakis got a $66 million contract for his security work for the US Government. From The Enterprise Report;

Pentagon criminal investigators, the FBI and the U.S. Attorney were all involved in the investigation into Lakis and how SSI obtained such a lucrative deal with such little oversight, but for unknown reasons, Lakis was never charged with a crime. When word of the scheme began to circulate around the special forces community in San Diego, California – where SSI was based – Lakis vanished, and later resurfaced in Australia.

Since then, Lakis has reinvented himself as a gun-for-hire, and T-E-R has confirmed his assignments have taken him to Iraq, Afghanistan and other war torn hotspots.

Rumor Control says that he faked his own death last week in 2010, but regardless, we can’t get his records because of the federal investigation. But, you know, Stolen Valor is a victimless crime.

Category: Phony soldiers