A Manhattan judge gave a 14-year sentence Monday to a serial conman who posed as a wounded US Army vet to lease a luxury car and tony apartment.
The sentence came after Jeremy Wilson spent 10 minutes telling the court how he didn’t know how to “fix” himself.
“I’ve spent pretty much my entire adult life running and hiding from myself, and running and hiding from what I have done,” the scammer said.
“Of all the lies I’ve told other people, it’s the lies I’ve told myself that make living the hardest,” Wilson added, barely containing a smirk as he talked.
“If things as fundamental as my last name can’t get sorted out by investigators who are very good at their job … I don’t know how to sort anything out,” said the 43-year-old, who has repeatedly claimed to be the lovechild of late IRA leader Brian Keenan.
Wilson claimed to be a US Army veteran with two Purple Hearts, and a doctor with two Ph.D.s from MIT. He allegedly stole an MIT corporate credit card from the campus mailroom and forged checks in order to lease a $55,000 BMW X3 in Boston. He later used the same fake identity to land a $5,000-a-month apartment in the Financial District.
“Who are we to say what is true and what’s not true?” defense attorney Robert Briere told the court Monday. “Who are we to say what’s happened to him and what’s influenced his life?”
Briere, who has filed motions asking that his client be referred to as “Jeremy Keenan” in court, replaced prominent attorney Edward Hayes — who only agreed to take the case after getting an appeal from the man he believed to be Keenan’s son. Hayes later withdrew, saying he was concerned he was being conned.
Prosecutor Diego Diaz cited Wilson’s complete lack of remorse, saying he has “spent his entire adult life devoted to fraud.”
“He claims to have been in a kibbutz in Israel, to have been shot in the head in Africa,” Diaz asserted. “He continues to perpetuate this fraud.”
The ADA noted that Wilson, who has “at least eight” felony convictions in his past, has been prosecuted for similar stunts across the US, including in Montana, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
“Jeremy Wilson posed as an airline executive, an MIT student, an Army veteran, and a member of an actors’ union,” Manhattan DA Cy Vance said in a statement following the sentencing. “Now the only uniform he will be wearing is a prison jumpsuit.”
“I think it may be helpful for me to quote Isaac Asimov,” Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Neil Ross told Wilson — who went by the pseudonym Jeremiah Asimov-Buckinhgam — just before he sentenced him.
“It has been my philosophy of life that difficulties vanish when faced boldly,” the judge said, quoting the science fiction writer. “You spoke earlier about not knowing the solution. Asimov has the solution for you. I urge you, regardless of where you are in the future, to face your challenges boldly.”