A Whitefish man, 51 year-old Matthew Marshall was sentenced on Thursday in Missoula Federal District Court to six years in prison and over $2 million in restitution for defrauding a Montana investor with tales of fake CIA rescue missions.

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KGVO News spoke to Supervisory Special Agent for the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigations Tod Wacaser about the case on Friday.

“The subject, Mr. Marshall, claimed to be a CIA operative or a former CIA operative, and he was doing off the books missions for the CIA,” began Wacaser. “Really, it was just a large fraud where he was not associated with the CIA and never had been. In addition, had claimed to have been Special Forces in the Marine Corps and was not Force Recon in the Marine Corps as he had claimed. So there was a lot of fake background put into it just to defraud the victim in this case.”

Wacaser provided details of how he was able to convince his victim to invest over $2 million in these alleged rescues.

“He had convinced the victim that he was doing off the books missions for the CIA in foreign countries, and that he was leading off the books rescue missions for individuals, either U.S. citizens or U.S. friendly foreigners, to get them out of a bad situation,” he said. “He convinced the victim in this case to fund those fictitious missions, and then took the money and just used it for himself.”

Wacaser said Marshall was a skilled storyteller in fabricating these rescue missions.

“Mr. Marshall put a lot of effort and time and was able to create a back story that was very convincing,” he said. “He went to some very large extents to make it look like his story was legitimate and that he was a CIA agent and that he was former Special Forces and that he had the backing of the current CIA to do these missions.”

Wacaser outlined the sentences and the restitution that Marshall faced in Missoula Federal District Court.

“He was sentenced to six years in prison for the fraud, and that includes the wire fraud, the money laundering and the tax evasion,” he said. “He was also sentenced to restitution of $2.355 million to the victim, and then the government as the second victim via tax that was owed on the fraudulent money that he earned in the amount of $899,327.”

Wacaser said Marshall will arrange to pay the restitution, and then self report to begin his six year federal prison term.

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