Fort Leonard Wood, MO. – A man pled guilty in federal court on August 8, 2024, for posing as a member of the United States military to defraud Fort Leonard Wood Service members of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Documents show that Steven Gibson pled guilty under a plea agreement to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
The case shows that the U.S. Army Criminal Investigations Division was notified in 2022 that trainees at Fort Leonard Wood were being targeted for fraud. One of the victims claimed that he had been contacted by an unknown First Sergeant, who claimed there was a payment issue that caused the victim to be owed back pay. The First Sergeant, later identified at Gibson, told the victim he needed to send money through CashApp to fix the payment issue.
After the call investigators looked into the situation and found the money had been sent to an account owned by Gibson, who then deposited the money in bank accounts outside of Missouri. After this lead, they found Gibson’s connection to many personal bank accounts owned by other individuals who were allegedly involved in the scam.
Documents say that additional records revealed that “…Gibson had defrauded or attempted to defraud over 2,000 service members of approximately $800,000, either through himself or his co-conspirators, in the same manner that was successfully carried out against [the victim].” Gibson is being ordered to pay $300,000 in the case and could face prison time.
