Brian Khan of Harrisburg claimed to be a Marine who served in Afghanistan. He had everyone fooled, including a documentary filmmaker and his own kids.
Read Harrisburg man who faked being a Marine even fooled his family, brother says, on PennLive.com.
Link supplied by a Lovefraud reader.
Skylar: I wouldn’t be surprised if the guy really thinks that Sparklehorse will write a good recommendation because she knows that he will stop making payments on the loan if she tells the truth. The S/P thought process here is that HE would write whatever was asked of him in order to keep a flow of money coming, so surely Sparklehorse will do the same. “Nobody’s asking you to sign under penalty of perjury, so what’s the big deal???”
The S/P pattern is to use people up and then dump them, with their social circle always being in a state of flux. When asked by a potential employer to come up with the names of three non-relatives who have known him for more than five years and can vouch for his character, the S/P often has great difficulty finding anyone to help him with this task, because everyone who met him five years ago dislikes him.
Sparklehorse: Box up his stuff and send him a registered letter telling him he has 30 days to pick it up, and if he doesn’t, you are going to give it to the Salvation Army. Keep a copy. Or have it delivered if you live nearby. I would NOT throw his stuff away.
A pastor of a large church told me that he was on a hiring committee for an additional pastor at a church one time, and the committee had narrowed down the list of candidates over a period of time, and finally picked the guy that they wanted to hire.
Somebody came up with the idea of running a background check on The Reverend, and it was a real eye opener. The private detective interviewed all of the man’s previous neighbors, and nobody said anything positive about him. He had borrowed tools and never returned them, there was a “neighborhood standard” on how often the grass should be cut, and this guy made no effort to keep his lawn maintained, etc. etc.
My ex-husband would not make the slightest effort to get along with anybody who wasn’t IMMEDIATELY useful to him in some way. He gave the appearance of being a successful businessman, but he could not see far enough into the future to realize that the neighbors, or their friends and relatives, might be a source of future business.
Sparklehorse’s husband may actually be dumb enough to think that she will help him get a job so that he will be in a better position to repay the money he owes her.
Thank you all for your replies. I greatly appreciate them all.
Truthspeak, you asked about the check he sent. While we were together, I ended up lending him money and letting him move in with me. It started off with me paying for medication at the pharmacy. He is diabetic and soon after the start of the new year, he was unable to pay for necessary insulin. During this period, he was actively interviewing for jobs and at the time of the first small loan, he had an oral offer for work that was rescinded. Then his lease came up and he couldn’t afford his apartment so he asked to move in with me. Then when the day came for his move, he told me he needed money to pay the balance with the movers. Once he was living with me, the slope got more slippery. I ended up paying for his airplane ticket to start his new job out of state. Then I paid for his ticket to come back here. It all added up to around $4000, not including all of his other expenses that I covered during the time we were together. It was like having a bratty child in some ways. As an example, when he came back from the new job to move away, we went to the grocery store and he just put toothpaste and soap and other toiletries that he needed in the cart and I paid for them. He never said thank you for such things. He did do a lot of cooking, a few little home repairs and drove me a lot of places and things like that.
About a week after we broke up, I emailed him to ask him what he thought he owed me and what a reasonable repayment plan was. In a fairly adult manner, we hashed this out and he promised to pay me back in monthly installments starting the next month. He paid an installment the following month after a fair amount of upset. Then he had excuses for the next month and then he paid a payment in December and was pretty nasty about it all. It was around this time that my friend’s comment that his lies were sociopathic sank in and I found this site and other information. I started No Contact and worked on letting go of the injustice and starting to heal.
This money and the stuff he left behind are effectively the only reasons to have any contact at all. Because of how things have played out, I have given him pretty much only silence since I realized what he is. In his mind though, it seems nothing has changed. I think he thinks he can still appeal to my compassion and the fact that I was his only cheerleader and supporter during his period of unemployment. Before I understood what he is, and when I rejected his “friends with benefits” overture, I softened the blow by saying that I will always love him and wish the best for him. I believe he is also banking on this statement.
Finally, I believe his expectation was that the US government would not contact me about this reference. He said that in his email last week. I also imagine that he didn’t know that the forms would ask specific questions about his character. I think he thought it would just be confirming that he lived in his prior apartment, lived with me, and then moved to where he (presumably) still lives.
The forms that I received do not have any specific contact person. They are forms that would be at least partly machine-read, with ovals that one has to fill in with a black pen. The form states, in part, “The information you provide, including your identity, will be disclosed to the person being investigated and other federal agencies, at this person’s request.” It also states, in the following paragraph, that “The person we are investigating has given written consent for this investigative inquiry…If…you would like to keep your identity confidential, please indicate this requirement in writing on the reverse.”
The loaded questions on the reverse are: “Do you have any reason to question this person’s honesty or trustworthiness?” and “Do you have any adverse information about this person’s employment, residence, or activities concerning: violations of the law, financial integrity, abuse of alcohol and/or drugs, mental or emotional stability, general behavior or conduct.” As I posted previously, if I were to respond, I would have to check all of these boxes. If you check these boxes, you have to provide specific information. There is also a box I could check that says “I wish to discuss the adverse information I have.”
I don’t want to help him but I also don’t want to hurt him. He hurts himself far more than I have the stomach for. As for why he asked me, I believe he thinks that no one else could confirm the period when he lived with me. He didn’t tell his children and ex-wife. At first, it was because he wanted to have time to catch up on child support and didn’t want his ex to ask for more money. Around this time, she reported him to the state and he had to start paying through the state. That’s all a whole other story.
Skylar, I do believe that this is a legitimate security clearance check. I visited him in his new place before we broke up and I met the recruiter who placed him in the job. We also spent the afternoon with the guy who is the HR officer for the company where he works. They do contract work for the Army and most of the people who work there are retired Army.
I have asked a few of my friends for advice too. My closest friend’s daughter had to get security clearance last summer to work in the Department of the Defense for an internship. Apparently, she was able to get her clearance without all her references replying. This friend recommended that I do nothing with the forms. I also asked another friend who works for a company that does DoD work and he has security clearance. His first response was that I should tell the truth and torpedo my ex. He felt it was my duty to be sure this guy doesn’t get security clearance. Because of my own professional status as an attorney, he said I would be “crucified” if I perjured myself at all, although that’s never been something I’ve considered doing. He also doesn’t really understand the spath component, even though I’ve told him a bit about it. When I told him I was scared of what my ex might do to retaliate, he got very upset and then said maybe I should just ignore the forms. He was going to make some other inquiries about the process for me but I haven’t heard that he learned anything more.
DfG, thank you for all of your comments, here and on the previous thread where I posted about this. I never married him, thank God, although strangely enough, he proposed in the middle of Devalue and Discard. I think he did love me in his own twisted spath way and is banking on the knowledge that I loved him. He doesn’t know how much I know about his behavior and what it means.
Regarding his stuff, I am only worried about this transaction if something with the security clearance backfires. Otherwise, my plan is to tell him it will be on the porch and he can come pick it up when he’s in town or else I will discard the things. I think he will behave if there isn’t some new level of rage being projected on me. I viewed the comment about missing me and my cat through Skylar’s 180 lens and remembering her stories about her spath, it scared me a little. He was never violent with me but again, following the 180 rule, he told me numerous times that he would never hit a woman, and that concerns me now.
At this point, my best plan is to cash the check and otherwise ignore him and the forms. I will be like Bartleby the Scrivener and prefer not to do anything. As I indicated above, I just want to be sure that I am not missing one mine in the minefield while I am busy stepping over some others.
Sorry for the long post but the devil is in the details!