Military Marriage Fraud?

[fordmaverick]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? OH

Short Story: A girl I was engaged to forged a marriage certificate to fool the army so she could make more money while deployed. Can someone please give me some advice on what to do? I called jag and they basically laughed at me.

Full Story
I was dating a girl for 2 years and then I moved into her apt. She got word she was going to be deployed. We were talking about marriage before and thought it would be a good time before she left. We got the marriage license and then I caught her in so many lies and decided to call it off. While she went to minnesota she told me she had the papers signed and sent in. I wasn't present and I didn't talk to anyone so I don't know how she did it. Well she was telling me all the benefits insurance Bah etc. etc. So she took me to the base and got me a military ID. I signed papers and they put me into the system.

She was in Ga getting ready to leave for Iraq and the apt next to us caught fire. They found out I wasn't on the lease and said that I had to leave. She then faxed a power of attorney paper but it expired 1/05/08 and the date it was signed was 2/11/08 so it was no good and she acted like she couldn't fax another. I stayed in the apt for as long as I could as I was finishing up school. She forwarded all the mail somewhere and all the bills were in her name cause she's a control freak, so I couldn't pay anything. Everything got shut off and I had to move everything myself in the snow with no heat. I never heard from here again til June, she never sent any money and she acted like it was no big deal. I had to drop all of my classes that spring because I couldn't afford to drive 200miles round trip everyday to school.

I told her that I wanted a divorce and she was back in ohio in a week trying to take me on vacation. She tried to buy me off or something. After that she made regular calls and sent me a little bit of money here and there pretty rare though. She comes back in Dec and I catch her in so many more lies it wasn't funny. Every word that came out of her mouth was a lie. I told her that I couldn't take the lying any more so she moved back to VA and I haven't heard anything since. I was looking at the marriage certificate and there isn't even a seal or watermark on it. I've never heard of the witnesses and it looks very very fake.

I just want to make sure that I don't get in any kind of trouble for her forging the marriage papers. I called jag and told them the story and they basically laughed at me. I'm still in school paying out of pocket and I don't have a lot of money right now. Can someone please offer me some advice on what to do or should I just leave it alone?

[kroam82]

First thing I would suggest is to request a certified copy of marriage certificate from where it is filed just to see if you are actually married. If you are married I would start annulment. If you are not, you could bring this up to her commander or first sergeant. They are usually your first line for stuff like this. I will caution you though, if you are not married you could also get yourself in trouble as you did sign saying you were married and obtained a military ID.

[fordmaverick]

I just found out that it might be fake though. She conned me into believing it was all real.

[kroam82]

Well if the marriage is fake she is in big trouble, but of course so could you. She is defrauding the government which is a big no no.

Ok, if you truly believed the marriage was legit, and can prove she coned you then you can take it to her first sergeant. If you do not know who it is then you can contact the military police for where she is stationed and give them her information and what is going on. They will then pass it on to her command and the appropriate investigative agency, if its army it will be the CID.

It may be very hard for them to accept that you actually believed you were married. Did you actually go to a justice of peace or preacher, say the vows and such. If not then why did you think you were married, a marriage license does not make you married? Not trying to be critical but I did investigations for the military for a good while and this is going to be a question they are going to ask.

Here is the drawback, they may not believe your story and she may claim that you were an accomplice. They may then also look at going after you. I believe the best thing to do is contact the authorities and tell them everything. However this is just my opinion. Take them anything you have to show she led you to believe you were married. It would be better for them to find out from you rather then someone else finding out and reporting it and it looking like you were trying to help hide it. To help your case you could send her an email confronting her on this issue and get her to admit to lying to you about the marriage. If you can get that then you should be in the clear, they will of course have to verify it did come from her.

Hope this helps, I just want you to know what actions to take and what could happen. Good luck I know it really sucks to be lied to and mislead.

[dad43]

if you knowingly went and signed for a dependent ID, the command themselves are going to KEEP laughing at you...

why? well, you MUST have known you were "married", b/c other than being on someone's "page 2"(dependent page), that's the only way to get one.....

go to the legal office, explain it to them...she's probably going to get in trouble for fraud, and un less there is A SLIM way you can show all you described(apt etc), you'll get in trouble for fraud also...idk how they do it, and they may leave you alone...

all i know is, crap they started doing bah checks a few years back, asking for leases, marriage licenses etc...

if you can, do a search in any state relating to her, and it'll take leg work, but find a copy of the LICENSE and find out if there's an actual marriage certificate...

this really isn't that uncommon...a shipmate of mine did it...his girl left 2 weeks after they got the license,and left him, then she got deployed...he had a notary friend copy the license, change the date, and sign for HER! when she was entered as a dual military spouse, it caught up to him, when she came home on R&R and someone told her....she sued him in court...he got kicked out, after sitting in the brig for 6months, and i doubt he's paid off the lien, as our bah was 1400, and she was gone for 10 months before she found out.