HONOLULU — A Hawaii couple with ties to Deep East Texas were found found guilty this week of stealing the identities of dead Texas babies to conspire against the U.S. government.
Jurors found Walter Glenn Primrose and Gwynn Darle Morrison guilty on Monday on charges of conspiracy, passport fraud and identity theft. The jury deliberated for about two hours after a trial in a U.S. District Court in Honolulu, according to the Associated Press.
Documents show after their home foreclosed in 1987, Primrose and Morrison obtained birth certificates for two deceased Texas infants to assume the identities of Bobby Edward Fort and Julie Lyn Montague.
An investigation determined Primrose was born in Shelby County. They both attended the same high school and went to Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches from 1976 to 1979.
They were married in 1980 in Nacogdoches and purchased the home that later foreclosed in 1981. After assuming the identifies of Fort and Montague, records state they remarried under the assumed identities in 1988 in Austin.
The couple also obtained driver's licenses, ID cards, Social Security accounts in Hawaii using deceased children's names. Primrose fraudulently enlisted into the U.S. Coast Guard in 1994 and served until his 2016 retirement using Fort's name. After that, he worked as a U.S. Department of Defense contractor until his arrest, the court documents read.
Additionally, the federal government found photos of both Primrose and Montague wearing KGB uniforms. However, the AP reported lawyers for the couple said they wore the uniforms once for fun and the prosecution later backed away from the Russian spy connection.
A federal special agent said Primrose and Morrison have been "fully living in these fraudulently assumed identities since 1987."
According to AP, the couple's sentencing is set for March.