Fake Marine’s lawyer says client wasn’t trying to steal valor
WESTFIELD, Ind. (WISH) – We’re now hearing from the other side of a confrontation between a Marine and a man pretending to be one.
The lawyer for the man caught wearing the military uniform said his client wasn’t trying to steal valor. Attorney Tim Stoesz said his client, Brian Schwoerer, the man posing as a Marine, has been dealing with some health issues lately that have affected him and they feel this incident is a result.
The confrontation took place after the graduation ceremony for Noblesville High School at the Indiana State Fairgrounds last week. The video was posted online and has more than 400,000 views.
“It bothers me and it bothers all vets really,” Marine veteran Brandyn Skaggs said Thursday as he looked back at the video.
In the video, Skaggs questions Schweorer about his military experience. Skaggs said the inconsistencies with Schwoerer’s uniform and inability to back up his story tipped him off that he was talking to an impostor.
But attorney Tim Stoesz saw something else. “(Schwoerer’s) not a bad guy, he’s suffering,” he said.
After the video made the news, Stoesz said Schwoerer’s familiy reached out to him.
Sitting in his Westfield office, Stoesz talked about how he’s represented Schwoerer twice and has known him for ten years.
“I’ve done enough family law, enough guardianships, enough mental health commitments that you know when you look at a client and you say ‘hey, talk to me,’ and they aren’t as responsive and the way they speak, you know when they’re not themselves,” said Stoesz. “And I just didn’t feel like (Schwoerer) wasn’t himself.”
Stoesz went on to say, “Mr. Schwoerer has two family members that were members of the military and I believe his son-in-law served in Afghanistan recently. So there’s nothing here of him trying to (steal valor). It legitimately is, I think, someone who’s having some health issues.”
In a phone interview Sunday, Skaggs said he had no idea Schwoerer might be dealing with health or mental issues.
“I probably would have handled it differently if I would have known his background,” said Skaggs. “But obviously at the time I didn’t. I just saw him out in public and you know it upset me and I did what I had to do by calling him out.”
Stoesz feels Skaggs had every right to act the way he did and said that he shouldn’t feel bad. He agrees that stealing valor is a problem, an act he says his client did not do on purpose.
“That’s why we want to react quickly and make certain that people understood this really isn’t that kind of a case,” he said.
Stoesz said he advised Schwoerer’s family to get him help but due to privacy issues could not explain exactly what kind.