A Maryland man who started a new life as an Irishman in Madison after assuming the identity of a Boston-area man with Down syndrome pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court to credit card fraud and identity theft.

J. Richard Glen Outhier, 37, also pleaded guilty to a federal credit card fraud charge that was transferred to Madison from a court in Texas, where he lived in 2005 before vanishing with the help of an identity broker, Outhier told U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb.

Outhier, known to many here as Irish bartender and emergency medical technician Jonathan Derr, will be sentenced July 22. He faces up to 42 years in federal prison, though federal sentencing guidelines will likely make his sentence much shorter after consideration for such things as admitting responsibility for the acts.

Outhier is also wanted for fraud in Wyoming and there is a warrant for his arrest in Colorado, where he disappeared from a community corrections facility in 1994 after serving part of a sentence for criminal impersonation.

In a statement that appeared to be far more detailed than Crabb expected, Outhier said he decided to turn himself in for the fraud in Wyoming, which happened in the fall of 2005, and for using Derr's identity after he came to Madison and met "some very good people," including a woman with whom he fell in love.

"I decide to surrender and take responsibility," he told Crabb.

Details his life

Outhier's statement detailed his life between 2005 and 2007. He said that in 2005, he was working in Texas as a commercial diver but lost the job after his employer learned he wasn't truthful about past criminal convictions, which included stays in federal prison for fraud.

Outhier was also dismissed from the Marine Corps for criminal activity that included, according to military court records, desertion and impersonating a Navy SEAL.

He said he got a job stocking supplies in a hospital emergency room. He was living beyond his means, he said, and used his position to get confidential patient information, which he used to obtain credit cards that he said he only intended to use to get out of a financial hole.

But finding that impossible to do, he used the cards to leave Texas. Assistant U.S. Attorney David Reinhard said the total loss to victims in Texas was about $23,000.

When police searched an apartment Outhier rented, Reinhard said, they found mail in the names of both victims of the credit card fraud.

Outhier said he met with an identity broker who got him the identity of a foreign national, which he said allowed him to live in the U.S. without any scrutiny. But Outhier said he became disenchanted with living a life that was about material things, so in 2006 he decided to change his way of life "for the better."

Though he thought about surrendering to authorities, he said he instead began doing relief work outside the U.S.

Decided to surrender

Eventually, he returned to the U.S. and again contacted the identity broker, who gave him Derr's identity. Outhier said he decided to check out his new identity by contacting Derr's parents. He did that by posing as a BBC reporter interested in doing a story about Down Syndrome.

Outhier ended up in Madison, he said, made a lot of friends here and fell in love. But he hadn't taken responsibility for the things he did. He said he told his girlfriend about his true identity in fall of 2007 and decided to surrender.

He drove to Wyoming and contacted an attorney, who talked him through the process of surrendering. He was in contact with Reinhard and with Secret Service agent Jack Leskovar in Madison and returned to Madison to surrender, which he did on Dec. 26.

But Reinhard said authorities were already investigating Outhier. Jo Ann Simons, mother of Jonathan Derr, in late 2006 received an overdue credit card statement in her son's name, then a letter from the Social Security Administration about benefits he earned working at the Claddagh Irish Pub in Middleton. She suspected identity theft and notified authorities.

In all, Reinhard said, the total loss on credit cards and a car loan taken out in Derr's name was about $27,000.

As part of a plea agreement, Outhier agreed to give a complete statement about his criminal activity to investigators. Reinhard said it was possible that the discussion could include information about the identity brokers who helped Outhier slip from one identity to another.