Former DEA official pleads guilty to scamming millions while posing as covert CIA officer

A former Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) public affairs officer on Thursday pleaded guilty to posing as a covert CIA operative in a complex ruse during which he bilked at least 12 companies out of more than $4.4 million.

The U.S. Department of Justice reported that according to court documents, Garrison Kenneth Courtney, who has never served in the CIA, claimed he was involved in a classified "task force" related to parts of the intelligence community and the Department of Defense. In reality, Courtney fabricated the story, and there was no such task force.

Courtney scammed businesses into hiring and paying him for "commercial cover" to conceal his supposed relationship with the CIA, according the Justice Department. He promised the companies that they would eventually receive government reimbursement, "sometimes by the award of lucrative contracts from the United States government in connection with the supposedly classified program," the DOJ said.

The deception was elaborate and involved many elements, the DOJ said. As part of the ruse, Courtney asked people to sign false nondisclosure agreements barring them from talking about the fictitious government program. He also concocted letters, supposedly from the U.S. Attorney General, that alleged to provide immunity to people participating in the program.

The DOJ notes that Courtney also "told victims and witnesses that they were under surveillance by hostile foreign intelligence services; made a show of searching people for electronic devices as part of his supposed counterintelligence methods; demanded that his victims meet in sensitive compartmented information facilities to create the illusion that they were participating in a classified intelligence operation; and repeatedly threatened anyone who questioned his legitimacy with revocation of their security clearance and criminal prosecution if they 'leaked' or continued to look into the supposedly classified information." 

Courtney developed a fake biography, which included false assertions that he had fought in the Gulf War and had amassed hundreds of confirmed kills.

He tricked actual government officials into believing his lies and then used those officials to perpetuate and bolster his scheme, the DOJ said. 

"For example, he directed his victims to speak with these public officials to verify his claims, and separately instructed the government officials as to exactly what to say," according to the DOJ. "Courtney thereby created the false appearance to the victims that the government officials had independently validated his story, when in fact the officials merely were echoing the false information fed to them by Courtney."

"At times, Courtney also convinced those officials to meet with victims inside secure government facilities, thereby furthering the false appearance of authenticity," the DOJ noted.

He also "fraudulently gained a position working as a private contractor for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Information Technology Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC)," according to the DOJ.

As a result, he was privy to information that he tried to use in order to direct government contracts to companies that had him on their payroll.

"Once he had installed himself at NITAAC, Courtney gained access to sensitive, nonpublic information about the procurements of other federal agencies being supported by NITAAC," the DOJ said. "Courtney thereafter used that information to attempt to corrupt the procurement process by steering the award of contracts to companies where he was then also on the payroll, and used the false pretext of national security concerns to warp the process by preventing full and open competition."