William Woods was homeless and living in Los Angeles when he learned that someone was racking up debt using his name. When he reported his concerns to the branch manager of a bank, he wound up spending nearly two years locked up, accused of identity theft himself. As he continued to insist he was Woods in a desperate effort to clear his name, he was sent to a state mental hospital and drugged. Last week, a former high-level Iowa hospital IT worker who had assumed Woods’ identity for decades pleaded guilty to two federal charges, the Associated Press reports. Matthew David Keirans, 58, of Hartland, Wi., faces up to 32 years in prison for making false statements to a National Credit Union Administration-insured institution and aggravated identity theft. Keirans spent 20 days in jail last year on related state charges in Iowa. A hearing will be held to vacate Woods’ conviction, said Venusse Dunn of the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.
Court records show the two men first met when they both worked at a hot dog cart in Albuquerque, N.M., in the late 1980s. There is no record of Keirans using his own name or Social Security number after 1988, and he started to publicly assume the name William Woods in 1990. Over the years, he married and had a child, all as Woods. He 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. With this identity, Keirans secured employment and took out loans, accumulating over $200,000 in debt. Upon discovering the debt, Woods attempted to rectify the situation at a California bank. However, due to security questions he couldn't answer, the bank called police, leading to Woods' arrest. Despite his protests, authorities charged Woods with identity theft and false impersonation. Throughout the ordeal, Woods adamantly asserted his true identity, which led to a prolonged legal battle and his eventual confinement in a state mental hospital. It wasn't until a detective conducted DNA testing, confirming Woods' identity, that the truth emerged.