Hot Dog Cart ID Theft Leads to Mental Hospital

[956 Worldwide 34908]

This is the wildest damn story I’ve read in a long time.  In 1988 a guy working at a hot dog cart in Albuquerque stole his colleague’s identity and a car.  That man went on to become a pretty well paid hospital IT administrator with a family. 
 

The real guy ended up with felony convictions, homeless, and was confined to a mental hospital for insisting he was himself. 
 

https://www.thegazette.com/crime-courts/former-university-of-iowa-hospital-employee-used-fake-identity-for-35-years/

Quote

Keirans used Woods’ identity “in every aspect of his life,” including obtaining employment, insurance and official documents, and even paying taxes under the name, according to a plea agreement signed by Keirans.

In 1990, Keirans obtained a fraudulent Colorado identification card with Woods’ name and birthday. He used the ID to get a job at a fast-food restaurant and to get a Colorado bank account. He bought a car for $600 in 1991, using Wood’s name, with two $300 checks that bounced.

He drove the stolen car to Idaho, where it broke down and he abandoned it. He withdrew all his money from the Colorado bank using an ATM in Idaho and left the state. An arrest warrant was issued for Woods in Colorado because of the stolen car, though documents don’t indicate whether Woods was arrested at that time.

It wasn’t the first time Keirans had stolen a car. When he was 16, he stole a car after running away from his adoptive parents’ home in San Francisco. He was arrested at the time in Oregon, under his own name, but never appeared in court, according to court documents.

In 1994 — six years after he started using Woods’ name — Keirans got married. He had a child, whose last name is Woods.

In 2012 — 24 years after he started using Woods’ name — Keirans fraudulently acquired a copy of Woods’ birth certificate from the state of Kentucky using information he found about Woods’ family on Ancestry.com.

By 2013, Keirans had moved to eastern Wisconsin. He started his IT job with UI Hospitals and worked remotely. He earned more than $700,000 in his 10 years working for the hospital. In 2023, his salary was $140,501, according to the hospital.

Keirans obtained multiple vehicle and personal loans from Iowa credit unions under Woods’ name between 2016 and 2022, totaling more than $200,000. He also had money stored in a national bank under Woods’ name, court documents state.

Woods’ arrest

In 2019, the real William Woods was homeless, living in Los Angeles. He went to a branch of the national bank and explained that he recently discovered someone was using his credit and had accumulated a lot of debt.

Woods didn’t want to pay the debt and asked to know the account numbers for any accounts he had open at the bank so he could close them.

Woods gave the bank employee his real Social Security card and an authentic California Identification card, which matched the information the bank had on file. Because there was a large amount of money in the accounts, the bank employee asked Woods a series of security questions that he was unable to answer.

The bank employee called Keirans, whose the phone number was connected to the accounts. He answered the security questions correctly and said no one in California should have access to the accounts.

The employee called the Los Angeles Police Department, and officers spoke with Woods and Keirans. Keirans faxed the Los Angeles officers a copy of Woods’ Social Security card and birth certificate, as well as a Wisconsin driver’s license Keirans had acquired under Woods’ name.

The driver’s license had the name William David Woods — David is Keirans’ real middle name — rather than William Donald Woods. When questioned, Keiran told an LAPD officer he sometimes used David as a middle name, but his real name was William Donald Woods.

The real Woods was arrested and charged with identity theft and false impersonation, under a misspelling of Keirans’ name: Matthew Kierans.

Because Woods continued to insist, throughout the judicial process, that he was William Woods and not Matthew Kierans, a judge ruled in February 2020 that he was not mentally competent to stand trial and he was sent to a mental hospital in California, where he received psychotropic medication and other mental health treatment.

 

 

[RPM 26426]

They know you're crazy if you think everyone else is wrong. Case closed.

[Helobious 9503]

That’s insane. Eventually got busted by a lowly University of Iowa police officer to boot. 

[RPM 26426]

4 minutes ago, Helobious said:

That’s insane. Eventually got busted by a lowly University of Iowa police officer to boot. 

[Beau Vine 54833]

Quote

The real Woods was arrested and charged with identity theft and false impersonation, under a misspelling of Keirans’ name: Matthew Kierans.

I'm not getting how the real Woods got tagged with Kierans' name?

[RDCanecutter 26550]

Hot dog people don't play.

[Jerry Callo 8828]

Pro tip:  if you ever get put in a mental institution - act like you're crazy and then get better.  Acting like you're not crazy doesn't work.

[RDCanecutter 26550]

16 minutes ago, Jerry Callo said:

Pro tip:  if you ever get put in a mental institution - act like you're crazy and then get better.  Acting like you're not crazy doesn't work.

My reaction to stress is to joke. My wife says the nurses aren't laughing, they are figuring out if I'm just crazy. So maybe one day I'll get to use your pro-tip.

[Dahobbs 17802]

On 4/3/2024 at 3:31 PM, Dahobbs said:

This story is insane. Basically, Matthew Kierans stole the identity of William Donald Woods for over 3 decades. He even got married and had children using the stolen name. When the real Mr. Woods discovered the issue and approached a bank about someone using a stolen credit card, the bank thought he was the imposter and called the police. As a result of criminal investigation, the state of California forced him into a mental institution and then, after his release, convicted him of felony identify theft and served over a year sentence. After he was released from prison, he managed to prove that he was the real Mr. Woods thanks to DNA evidence and the work of detectives in Iowa. Kierans now faces a 33 year prison sentence. 

1) The dude deserves a lot of money from LA police;

2) This is going to be a movie or Netflix series in the next 5 years, I'm sure of it. 

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/04/man-pleads-guilty-to-stealing-former-coworkers-identity-for-30-years/

I'm not as good at thread titles it seems. 

[Dahobbs 17802]

1 hour ago, Beau Vine said:

I'm not getting how the real Woods got tagged with Kierans' name?

The state of California decided that was his name. It seems like the real Kierans must have been involved in someway, but it isn't clear from the articles I've seen. 

[MissingInAction 25299]

3 hours ago, RDCanecutter said:

Hot dog people don't play.

[Mrs Whiggins 13050]

To be Frank   frank, it seems like Kierans ought to serve the full 30 years for his crime(s). Nothing the real Woods said could cut the mustard with authorities until they used the DNA evidence to ketchup to Kieran's subterfuge.

[956 Worldwide 34908]

3 hours ago, Dahobbs said:

I'm not as good at thread titles it seems. 

Sorry man, didn’t mean to steal any thunder, I scanned the front page. To be fair I did it at like 0700 on the morning train. 

15 minutes ago, Mrs Whiggins said:

To be Frank   frank, it seems like Kierans ought to serve the full 30 years for his crime(s). Nothing the real Woods said could cut the mustard with authorities until they used the DNA evidence to ketchup to Kieran's subterfuge.

[Armybrat 40987]

4 hours ago, RDCanecutter said:

My reaction to stress is to joke. My wife says the nurses aren't laughing, they are figuring out if I'm just crazy. So maybe one day I'll get to use your pro-tip.

First time I went in to have the cardio nurse adjust my new pacemaker, I clutched my chest and flopped around just a little bit. 
She was not amused…and said that was a first for her. 
Mrs. Brat said I was lucky the nurse didn’t zap me with the defibrillator paddles set on megaboost.