Tangled Web (Massachusetts man impersonates Air Force general for fun and profit)

Mr. McManus wears U.S. Air Force fatigues with his name and the distinctive single star of a brigadier general.

PAXTON, MA -- The smooth-talking former Paxton man, who once mingled with Worcester's business and political elite, wore his guises effortlessly by all accounts.

As far as anyone knew, Kevin B. McManus was an engineer, just like it said on the business cards he handed out here and in Florida. He talked his way into a lucrative consulting job near Tampa late last year. He even was hired to testify in March as an engineering expert in a construction lawsuit in Brookline.

And Mr. McManus, 46, the former owner of the now-defunct Everest Construction Inc. of Westboro, was striding around Florida's Gulf Coast wearing the camouflage uniform of a U.S. Air Force general as recently as a few weeks ago, neighbors said. The holiday greeting he sent out last winter included a photograph of him in combat boots and desert fatigues — the distinctive single star denoting a brigadier general sewn on each collar.

He once showed his fiancée in Florida, Carol Vutano, what appeared to be a press release from the Department of Defense announcing his promotion to two-star general.

The so-called “Statement by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates” trumpeted Major Gen. McManus' three Purple Hearts, military decorations bestowed on soldiers wounded in combat. It proclaimed him one of “the most decorated combat pilots in the history of the USAF,” and stated he was in line to receive the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military award for valor.

The official-looking release is a fake, according to a Department of Defense spokeswoman.

“He has an identification badge that has one star on it, and while we were dating, he showed me one with two stars. Then he supposedly got promoted to three stars,” Ms. Vutano said in a telephone interview from her home in Florida.

Mr. McManus often bragged of a close relationship with Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander of U.S. Central Command, she said.

“It was always, ‘I'm a three-star general. Gen. Petraeus is my best friend.' All this crap, he told me,” Ms. Vutano said.

But the elaborate veneer of invented accomplishment and heroism that Mr. McManus had painstakingly constructed over his true identity — that of a brazen con man who once allegedly fleeced one of his oldest friends in Massachusetts out of money she and her husband had set aside for an adoption or a surrogate — has cracked and peeled away under scrutiny.

Since the Telegram & Gazette reported in late June that Mr. McManus is not an Air Force general and that he stands accused in local lawsuits and bankruptcy cases of conning close friends and associates out of millions of dollars through bogus business deals, a number of people here and in Florida have come forward to expose the full and shocking scope of his deception.

In Massachusetts last fall, he made his way through the local doctor's office where his girlfriend at the time worked, shaking hands and introducing himself to the Oxford woman's co-workers as a two-star general in the Air Force Reserve, she recalled.

He told her he ran the “Eastern Division” of the Department of Homeland Security — there is no such office in the department — and was an engineer who operated a company based in England, where he had inherited a castle, she said.

In September, Mr. McManus gave her a ring and asked her to marry him, said the woman, who asked that her name not be published because she fears the publicity could harm her children.

The proposal came just eight months after his first wife, Deborah McManus, died “after being stricken suddenly at her home” in February 2008, according to the death notice submitted by the family.

Deborah McManus was 45 at the time of her death. The state Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, which conducted an autopsy, ruled the cause of death as “respiratory arrest of undetermined cause.”

However, the bogus Department of Defense press release created by Mr. McManus, a copy of which Ms. Vutano provided to the T&G, claims that he relocated to Florida after his wife “was killed in a car accident.”

The Oxford woman eventually became suspicious of Mr. McManus' improbable stories and broke off the engagement before the wedding, she said.

In the Tampa suburbs where he lived until recently, Mr. McManus told acquaintances that he was a former fighter pilot who had been shot down twice over Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War. He told some a tale of being mistakenly shot down over the United States during a demonstration flight when a congressman accidentally pulled the trigger on a surface-to-air missile he was being shown.

In March, Mr. McManus quietly slipped back into Massachusetts to testify as a paid expert in a Brookline construction lawsuit while masquerading under oath as a civil engineer. But an astute lawyer for the construction company being sued in the case saw through the act and picked apart the ruse during cross-examination.

“He was under oath in a conference room telling the arbitrator an elaborate story about being a brigadier general, holding a top secret clearance, and being the impetus to his company landing a half-billion dollar government contract for civil services. He told a very good story,” said the Boston lawyer, Jason A. Manekas of Bernkopf Goodman LLP.

“But, when he was pressed on cross-examination, he couldn't answer simple questions, like his company's phone number, his boss's phone number, or the name of the receptionist,” Mr. Manekas recalled in an interview. “This guy lied about virtually everything. From fake degrees to fake licenses, it was all lies.”

The arbitrator later ruled in favor of the construction company, noting in his lengthy report that much of McManus' testimony “was totally lacking in credibility on its face.”

While in Massachusetts in March, he explained his absence to acquaintances in Florida by saying that he had been tapped by the White House for shadowy missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, they said.

To John Rugman and Timothy Cullinan, partners in a Florida construction startup who were trying to land a contract at MacDill Air Force Base near Tampa, Mr. McManus seemed like a person with just the expertise and clout they needed to help them get government work for their fledgling company. They said they paid Mr. McManus, whom they had met through a mutual friend last August, some $15,000 in consulting fees before they got wise to the scam early this year.

The partners said Mr. McManus was extremely convincing and had them persuaded that he was nailing down the final details of a big contract with the Air Force, but they became suspicious late last year after months of delays and excuses. They asked for some evidence that Mr. McManus was close to securing a government contract.

“He produced a letter of intent that essentially was on Air Force letterhead and said in specific terms that we as a company would be receiving a contract from the Air Force. That was a complete fabrication on his part,” Mr. Cullinan said.

At the time, though, the partners were convinced. They began to gear up for a big concrete pouring job at the base. They also continued to pay Mr. McManus.

But when the men approached Air Force officials at the base early this year about the supposedly forthcoming contract, they were met with shrugged shoulders, they said.

“They had no knowledge of the letter, and they had no knowledge of Mr. McManus,” Mr. Cullinan said. “It was a hard lesson we had to learn. It just was a complete series of fabrications and deceptions.”

Mr. McManus contacted them a few more times with claims of imminent contracts, but they never saw him again. Shortly after that, he decamped from the Parrish, Fla., house where he had been staying, the men said.

Left behind in the construction company office was an official-looking “Department of Defense Registered Vehicle” placard that purports to be issued by Hanscom Air Force Base in Bedford. A spokesman for the base said the placard appeared to be adapted from a parking decal that was phased out several years ago. There was no record of the listed registration number in the base's database, the spokesman said.

The T&G also has obtained two photographs, from two different sources, of Mr. McManus posing in a camouflage uniform on which “McManus” and “U.S. Air Force” are embroidered and carrying a single star denoting the rank of brigadier general. In both photographs, Mr. McManus displays on his uniform what appears to be a military identification card.

Mr. McManus did not respond to e-mailed requests for an interview this past week. The telephone numbers listed on his business cards are no longer active.

In a telephone interview in late June, Mr. McManus denied posing as a general, but acknowledged that he owes money to former friends and business associates in the Worcester area. The total amount is more than $1 million, according to court records. Mr. McManus said that he was a changed man and now does Christian missionary work.

He said he had been living a good life and staying out of trouble since moving to Florida last year.

But one person who is not buying his claims of turning over a new leaf since arriving in Florida is Ms. Vutano, the nurse and mother of four, who married Mr. McManus in June.

She had met him on the Internet dating site eHarmony last fall. In the throes of a tough divorce, she recalled that the confident and kind man with a teenage son of his own seemed like a catch. The relationship progressed quickly and they soon were engaged. Mr. McManus pressed for the marriage to be moved up prior to her leaving for a trip to Guatemala with her church group. She agreed and they were wed on June 4.

While she was away, Ms. Vutano said, her new husband's behavior turned erratic and overbearing. He called constantly, making a nuisance of himself and interfering with the work she was in Guatemala to do, she said.

Ms. Vutano returned to Florida on June 22, one day after the initial T&G story on Mr. McManus was published. Her son found the story online and showed it to his mother just as Mr. McManus was returning to the house from an errand, she said.

“I had only read the first two or three sentences, where it said ‘con man' and all that, when he got home. That was all I had time to read, but I told him to get out,” she said.

Ms. Vutano said she's more relieved than heartbroken to know the truth, but her children took the news hard.

“My daughter, who is just 11 and loved this man and had a great relationship with Kevin's son … she didn't get out of bed for two days. She just cried and cried,” she said. “He hurt my children severely.”

The single-mother scraped together $1,700 to pay a lawyer to draw up annulment papers in July. She had to wait until she got her paycheck this past week to pay the $318 filing fee to submit them at the courthouse. She hopes to get a court date in five or six weeks and then have Mr. McManus out of her life for good.

She said she can't believe that authorities in Massachusetts and Florida allow such a man to walk around freely masquerading as a senior military officer conning people out of love or money as it suits him.

Several people interviewed in June by the T&G said they also had been contacted about Mr. McManus by a state trooper detective assigned to Worcester District Attorney Joseph D. Early's office. A spokesman for Mr. Early said he couldn't confirm or deny the existence of an ongoing investigation.

“I am completely appalled,” Ms. Vutano said. “Why can't you arrest him? Why can't you do anything?”

Hate to say, but one look at the photo and my BS meter pegged, then broke.

Generals just do not 'walk around' in fatigues
Generals, esp USAF, are skinny to a fault (well, most of ‘em anyway. ANd they love to wear flight suits.
Outdoors and no cover
And on and on.

Hope they throw the book at this EssoBee

Me too. saying he was shot down when we just learn today that the remains of a real hero Speicher have been found. This guy needs to go to jail. He’s only asking for forgiveness because he got CAUGHT! He’s a LOSER.

Nah, I think ObaMao will promote him. He may need some “generals” of his own soon and this guiy has just the right credentials for him.

Hilarious!

I love this:

While in Massachusetts in March, he explained his absence to acquaintances in Florida by saying that he had been tapped by the White House for shadowy missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, they said.

I can’t tell you how often some of my single female friends meet a guy in a bar, who can’t tell them too much about himself, because he is on a mission. He’s a gov’t assassin who’s back for a few weeks from Afghanistan. That kind of stuff. And since women love Fascists....

Then, they find out he’s a married farmer from Tennessee or something.

parsy.

Never ran a lab IN HIS LIFE. Wore his disguise with EASE..?! Nobody but a journalist would believe this BS —wow!

I hope this poor, sick man gets well soon...!

Crazy nut...

LOL! And some women I know....I have another acquaintance who spent some time in the joint. Has prison tats all over. Love and hate on knuckles. His pick-up line is that he’s a doctor. Trust me,he looks nothing like a doctor. No teeth. No couth.

AND IT WORKS!

parsy, who loves his guitar.

Heck, I tell chicks I'm the chief ROTC instructor at George Fox University....

While one of them picks up on that, I'll wu her beyond...

LMAO !!!

Hey if Obama can pretend to be president then fat losers can at least be drug store generals.........< /sarcasm>

Several times a day, every day, a current serviceman, retiree, or veteran gets to kick him in the balls.

Better than hanging.

What a putz! I used to work for General Officers a lot, and then knew several after they retired. They’re VERY “unlikely” individuals... much unlike this asshat in the article. I’ve got a friend right now who retired from the USN and turned down a promotion to Admiral in the process. He’s a classic example. Very “low key”... until you corner him, or drag ire out of him (which is DIFFICULT to do)... then people are very, VERY sorry. :-) All of us Vets who know his past “entreat” him accordingly, and he treats us like nephews and grandsons. But I’ve seen him revert ONCE back into O-6 mode and you should have seen people move! :-)

I was gonna say... I’ve never seen a general with as much fat hanging off of him as this guy... you’re right... a goodly portion of the General Officers I used to work around were skinny/wirey dudes. :-)... generally “quiet”, and very good to work for.

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