Former Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman, Garrison Kenneth Courtney, was sentenced to seven years in prison for posing as a CIA officer to defraud several companies in a $ 4.4 million fraudulent scheme.
For years, Harrison Courtney has convinced people that he is not just a federal public affairs official, but in fact an undercover CIA agent working on a classified task force, The Washington Post reports.
Courtney’s criminal scheme looked like this. He approached private companies, telling them that he was a CIA officer. He then persuaded companies to informally fund a secret task force. For this, he promised the heads of companies to pay later compensation for their participation.
At the same time, the victims believed that they were fulfilling their patriotic duty by supporting him.
The fraud was reportedly so compelling that even when interrogating the people he had defrauded, they were confident that talking about Courtney would betray his secret program.
According to his scheme, the perpetrator received more than $ 4.4 million. He embezzled more than $ 1 million and used the rest of the funds to pay companies that supported him.
– Courtney will now spend the next seven years in federal prison for his deceitful and felonious criminal conduct, – US Attorney said in a statement.
The prosecutor’s office also said that Courtney became so engulfed in his pretend role as a CIA operative that he was “dangerously” close to being immune from prosecution if he convinced federal officials to legitimize the fraudulent program he created.
Courtney pleaded guilty on June 11, but while out on bail, prosecutors said, he continued his scheme.
