Former DEA Official Pleaded Guilty to Wire Fraud

On June 11, 2020, a former DEA Public Affairs Official pleaded guilty in the Eastern District of Virginia to one count of wire fraud.  Garrison Kenneth Courtney, who was employed with the DEA from in or about 2005 through in or about 2009, pleaded guilty in the Eastern District of Virginia. According to the factual statement in support of the guilty plea, from in or about 2012 through in or about 2016, Courtney engaged in a fraud scheme that involved posing as an undercover CIA operative in order to defraud government contractors out of approximately $4.5 million.  Courtney approached numerous private companies and claimed that the companies needed to hire and pay him to create what Courtney described as “commercial cover,” i.e., to mask his supposed affiliation with the CIA.  Courtney also fraudulently claimed that the companies would be reimbursed in the future for these salary payments, sometimes by the award of contracts from the United States government. The investigation is being conducted by the OIG’s Washington Field Office with forensic assistance provided by the OIG’s Cyber Investigations Office, the FBI, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, and other federal law enforcement agencies.