‘Ranger’ faker admits he made up story - Army News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Army Times

‘Ranger’ faker admits he made up story

If his claims had been true, Jeff “Rock” Harris would have been one of the most highly decorated Americans since the Vietnam War.

Harris, 46, told an audacious tale to the Kinston Free Press, a North Carolina newspaper. He said he was a former Army Ranger who had racked up 316 sniper kills, earned 70 medals and been wounded in the action that inspired the movie “Black Hawk Down.”

The article ran in the edition on the Sunday before July 4. But almost immediately after the Free Press and other newspapers ran the story, it came under fire on Internet bulletin boards and by military fraud-hunters who smelled a rat.

On July 5, Harris told Army Times in a brief phone interview that he made up the whole thing, and he apologized profusely. Harris said his conscience and his faith forced him to confess.

“Obviously, I did some things in the military, but it was nothing like what was in the article, it was my lie, and I don’t even have an explanation,” Harris said. “All I can do is apologize.”

Harris said he had served in the Army from 1987 to 1996 or 1997, when he was honorably discharged as a sergeant, and that he took part in the Persian Gulf War. He refused to elaborate. Army Times has made an inquiry with the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, but was unable to immediately confirm Harris’ claims.

Just a few days before he spoke to Army Times, Harris told the Free Press that he was one of the elite troops who took part in 1993’s Operation Restore Hope and in the Battle of Mogadishu, Somalia, in which 18 soldiers died. He cast himself as a reluctant hero and claimed to have repeatedly refused director Ridley Scott’s offers to contribute to the movie based on those events.

Among other accomplishments, Harris claimed to have 316 confirmed sniper kills in three years and an unheard-of collection of awards, including the Distinguished Service Cross, the Soldiers Medal, two Silver Stars, 31 Army Achievement Medals and 23 Army Commendation Medals.

Doug Sterner, curator of the Military Times Hall of Valor and a stolen-valor watchdog, said only two soldiers were awarded both the Distinguished Service Cross and the Silver Star since the Vietnam War, and Harris’ name is not among them.

“No other sniper in history that I’m aware of has more than 200 kills,” Sterner said.

After questions about Harris surfaced, Harris called Kinston Free Press reporter Jane Moon to ask for a story retraction. By the afternoon of July 5, the newspaper’s web site removed the story with a note explaining that it was “looking into conflicting information concerning details of that story.”

Moon told Army Times that she had trusted Harris. Only since has she learned how widespread stolen valor cases have become.

“From now on, I’m not going to take anything at face value,” Moon said.

Moon said there would be no simple retraction. She said she was working hard to separate the truth from the falsehoods for a follow-up story, and so far she was finding nothing to back Harris’ claims.

On July 7, the newspaper published an article citing soldiers from the 75th Ranger Regiment who served in Mogadishu and said they had “never heard” of Harris.

“We got had by the guy,” Moon said. “We should have done more research, but who would have thought that someone would fabricate this much and be completely audacious?”

The story also appeared in the Fayetteville Observer, published in the hometown of the real-life 82nd Airborne Division and a hub for the special operations community. The Fayetteville Observer published its own report on July 6 that Harris’ story was in doubt.

Mike Ranger, executive vice president of the U.S. Army Ranger Association, said that between the nation’s patriotism and the ability to rapidly disseminate information online, it has gotten harder and harder for military fakers to hide.

“It’s very difficult for someone to make bold claims, and you’re going to get caught, it’s just a matter of time,” Ranger said. “There are a lot of people out there who question when someone says he’s something he’s not. And the sheer poundage of awards this guy’s claimed, he’d have to be getting one every hour.”

‘They’re going to get nailed’

Mary Schantag, whose POW Network website is dedicated to exposing military fraudsters, said that she had been getting emails for days about the Harris article.

Schantag said that she has seen an increasing number of reporters getting duped as Moon had, particularly around patriotic holidays like Independence Day.

“Unless they start their story months ahead of time and have the time to check it out, they’re going to get nailed,” Schantag said of journalists. “I mean, this isn’t the only one this week we’ve got questions on. It’s just the biggest one, getting a lot of attention because the claims are extraordinary.”

Most galling to veterans was that Harris claimed a scene in “Black Hawk Down,” in which a young soldier bleeds to death after his leg was blown off, was based on him. In fact, the soldier who inspired the scene was real-life casualty Cpl. Jamie Smith, a 21-year-old Army Ranger.

Harris claimed the movie stretched events and that in reality he narrowly escaped paralysis when a bullet traveled a circuitous path from his leg into his spine, where it remains.

“That would have been me,” Harris told the Kinston Free Press. “I got shot, and cut my femoral artery, but we got out the next morning. I lived, but that wouldn’t have been as good of a story line.”

Sterner said this was the fabrication that most disturbed him.

“It changes the whole history of that action, it perverts the history of the Black Hawk Down mission,” Sterner said. “It was against Jamie, it was against his family and it was against history.”

Marc Bowden, the reporter whose book was the basis for the movie, said that he keeps master lists of Task Force Ranger and all of the injured. Harris’ name is not on any of his lists.

“I had never heard of him before. Period,” Bowden said.

Bowden said that “once or twice a year,” he helps debunk the claims of a phony participant in the Black Hawk Down action.

“I’ve been outraged,” he said. “It’s an insult to the heroism of the men who served. It’s far more widespread than I ever would have imagined.”

Angry people have been lashing Harris directly. He said he has “received a huge amount of hate mail” and that his employer, a local alarm company, has been receiving calls.

“It’s my own fault, and I’m not criticizing anybody for it, I understand, and I’d rather just put my apology out there,” he said. “Who has an explanation for lying like that? I don’t and I just apologize more than I can say, and the retraction’s coming.”