Chinese Man Arrested For Running Fake Army Unit

Apr 13, 2011 by James

A Chinese man from the Los Angeles suburb of El Monte has been arrested for conning other Chinese immigrants by having them join the Army; for a price. Yupeng Deng, 51, was arrested for running an illegitimate Army “unit” and charging its unit members for entrance. Deng even went as far as buying his “recruits” military uniforms and taking them to the decommissioned USS Midway aircraft carrier museum in San Diego. However instead of the Army paying the “recruits” the “recruits” were paying the “Army.” Deng was charging them around $300 a piece.

The official charges are theft by false pretenses, manufacturing deceptive government documents and counterfeit of an official government seal. They don’t sound too menacing but they do carry an 8 year prison sentence if convicted of all counts. Deng allegedly was telling these recruits that by joining his unit, the U.S. Army/Military Special Forces Reserve unit (MSFR), that they would gain citizenship. Deng who was the “Supreme Commander” of this unit also charged his recruits for increases in rank which in the real world should have meant more money for them.

The scam was fairly well put together as Deng had even issued his recruits fake ID cards and having them fill out paperwork which apparently looked quite real. Sheriff’s deputies arrested Deng on Tuesday and he is currently being held on $500,000 bail while he awaits his hearing that is scheduled for today.

I have to give the guy credit as it is an ingenious scam. He not only created a fake military unit but he got his soldiers to pay him. I guess the title Supreme Commander has its advantages. Frankly the U.S. military should hire him and put him in charge of recruitment command. If we can convince people to join the military and pay the government for their service then I’d say Deng just solved the debt crisis. In all honesty though its probably a good thing that this guy had no clue as to the workings of the U.S. military. The title “Supreme Commander” is a communist title but if he had used General or any other American military officers title then he would have been hanged by the government. So immigrants of America join the Army, see San Francisco and pay your commander a fee for rank and citizenship so you too can be Army strong!

Source: MSNBC