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A Wisconsin man faces decades behind bars for a 36-year-old identity theft scheme in which the victim was sent to jail and even a mental hospital because authorities didn’t believe his story.
Matthew Keirans, 58, faces up to 32 years in prison for making false statements to a National Credit Union Administration secured institution and aggravated identity theft.
In 2019, the victim, William Woods, was a homeless man living in Los Angeles when he discovered someone was racking up debt using his name. Woods walked into a California bank, said he didn’t want to pay, and tried to close the accounts Keirans had opened in his name.
He provided his social security card as well as his California ID. The branch manager asked the real Woods a series of security questions. Unable to respond, the bank called police, according to court records.
Keirans, who is listed as Woods on the account, told police he did not give anyone in California permission to access his bank accounts. He then faxed police a series of fraudulently acquired identification documents, court records show.
Police arrested Woods and charged him with identity theft and impersonation. They insisted that Woods was actually called Matthew Keirans, although it is unclear how police linked Woods or the bank accounts to that name.
Because Woods repeatedly questioned the identity authorities imposed on him, a California judge found him mentally incompetent to stand trial and sent him to a state psychiatric hospital, where he received psychotropic medications.
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Woods spent 428 days in the county jail and 147 days in the psychiatric hospital before being released after accepting a no-contest plea. He was ordered to pay $400 in fines and stop using the name William Woods. Still, Woods continued to push to get his identity back.
Woods contacted the University of Iowa Hospital, where Keirans had used his ID to get a job and was earning more than $100,000 a year. Security there referred Woods’ complaint to University of Iowa police.
Keirans initially insisted in an interview that the victim was “crazy” and “needed help and should be locked up,” federal prosecutors said. But a detective located the biological father listed on Woods’ birth certificate and compared the father’s DNA to Woods’. The test showed that Woods was the man’s son.
When police confronted Keirens about the DNA evidence, he said, “My life is over” and “Everything is gone.” He pleaded guilty to federal charges this week.
Court records show the two men met when they both worked at a hot dog cart in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the late 1980s. There is no record of Keirans using his own name or social security number. after 1988, and began publicly assuming the name William Woods in 1990, court documents show.
As the years passed, Keirans married and had a son, all like Woods. She even used a genealogy website to research Woods’ family history and used that information to fraudulently obtain a copy of Woods’ Kentucky birth certificate, federal prosecutors said.
No sentencing date has been set in the federal case, but Keirans spent 20 days in jail last year on related state charges in Iowa. Meanwhile, a hearing will be held next week in California to overturn Woods’ conviction.
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