Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - Man Steals Another Man's Identity for 30 Years - The William Woods story

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

This is the story of William Woods and how he had his identity stolen, by an identity thief for over 30 years.

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But, Pretender takes his wallet. But luckily, William Woods catches him, and he gets all up in Pretender's grill. And Pretender, he gets scared, and he gives the wallet back. And all of William Woods' documents are still in there, his Social Security card, his birth certificate. So William thinks nothing more of it. But while Pretender didn't take anything, he was able to get all of William Woods' personal information. And Pretender, he flees to Colorado, because he's got a plan. While in Colorado, he uses William Woods' information to get a state ID card.

Then he uses that state ID card to buy a car in William Woods' name. And he buys it using checks and all the checks end up bouncing. But by the time they bounce, he's already fled to another state where he just abandons the car. So police, they issue an arrest warrant for him. But not in Pretender's name, in William Woods's name. Then, about three years later, Pretender ends up meeting a nice woman and they fall in love. And they eventually get married. But even to her, he's still pretending to be William Woods.

So she takes his last name, well, William's last name. And they even have a baby together who also has the last name Woods. So Pretender lives life under the name William Woods over the next decade. And he eventually goes on one of those genealogy websites, and he looks up the real William Woods' family tree history. And then he uses this information to apply for a birth certificate. And he gets it. So now he has a William Woods birth certificate.

And he uses that to get a William Woods driver's license and a William Woods Social Security card. So now, legally, Pretender is William Woods. Then about a year later, he uses this identity to get a well-paying job, working remotely for an Iowa hospital as an administrator. And over the next 10 years, he gets promotions and raises, and he keeps climbing the corporate ladder. And soon enough, they got him on salary and he's making over a hundred grand a year. He's taken out car loans and personal loans.

He's even paying taxes using this fake identity. At this point, Pretender's been living as William Woods for over 30 years. Meanwhile, there's the real William Woods. And for him, life isn't going as well. He's fallen on hard times. He's living on and off of the streets of Los Angeles. And one day, he discovers that he's in a lot of debt, debt that he didn't rack up. And he finally learns that someone's been using his credit to take out loans.

So he goes to the local branch of this bank and he's like, hey, I didn't take out all these loans. So there's no way I'm paying all this money back. And he tells them someone must have stolen his identity. And he asks them to close any accounts under his name. And then he shows them all of his IDs and all the info matches. So the bank tries to verify by asking him some security questions like, when was this account open? Stuff like that.

And of course, William Woods doesn't know the answer to these security questions because he wasn't the one who opened the account. So the bank manager calls the phone number tied to that account, which is Pretender's number. And Pretender can answer these security questions. So bank manager's like, hey, someone here in California is trying to access your account. And pretenders like, no one in California should be accessing my account. So the bank connects Pretender to the LAPD.

The LAPD asks him for proof that he's the real William Woods. And of course, Pretender faxes them over the birth certificate he fraudgently obtained. So now police are like, okay, I guess this guy at the bank must be a fraud. So they arrest the real William Woods and they charge him with identity theft and false impersonation. So now he's in jail. And even as he's locked up, William Woods' key. keeps insisting that he's the victim of identity theft and no one believes him. And so he sits in jail for 450 days waiting on his trial.

But he never changes his story. He never backs down. And over time, police and prosecutors, they start thinking he's legitimately crazy. So a judge ends up declaring him incompetent to stand trial. And they sentence him to a psychiatric hospital. And worse, they start medicating him to control what they feel is a mental condition. So the real William Woods sits in that psychiatric hospital for 147 days until his sentence is over. And they finally release him and he has to pay a small fine and they order him to stop using the name William Woods. But William, he's not going to stop.

He's determined to get his life back. So he does some research and he's eventually able to deduce that the identity thief pretender works for an Iowa hospital. So he calls that hospital and they aren't really listening but they refer him to the police. So he hits up the police and there he finally gets someone to agree that this is all very strange and that they should look into Pretender. So police bring Pretender in and they question him and he still insists that he's the real William Woods and that the other guy is some crazy identity thief who needs to be locked up. But police still think it's weird because they both have a legitimate birth certificate. So they end up looking at the name of the father on the birth certificate and they track him down, William Woods's biological dad. So they have him to a DNA test and of course his DNA matches.

with the real William Woods. So finally, after over 30 years, boom, police arrest pretender. Here's his mugshot. And he ends up pleading guilty to aggravated identity theft and some other stuff. And he's currently still awaiting his sentencing. While the real William Woods, he's currently living in a friend's van now, but he is in the process of getting his life back together. And his original jail conviction has been vacated. Good for him. Shout out to California, Colorado, Iowa, Wisconsin. Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website to marketing, to selling and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of

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