COLORADO SPRINGS, June 7 (UPI) -- The founder of a Colorado veterans group and advocate for homeless vets has been unmasked as an imposter who faked a war record, investigators said.

Rick Strandlof -- who used the name Rick Duncan when he claimed to be a U.S. Naval Academy graduate who was wounded during his third tour in Iraq -- has not been charged with impersonation, The Denver Post reported Sunday. The FBI is investigating possible fraud while Strandlof is being held on a misdemeanor traffic charge in Colorado Springs.


Army Spc. Garett Reppenhagen said Strandlof worked hard with the Colorado Veterans Alliance.

"I can't say I hate Rick Duncan for what he did," Reppenhagen said. "But I certainly never want to talk to him again."

Strandlof was actually a high-school dropout from Wyoming. Marine veteran Robert Strandlof of Spokane Valley, Wash., who said he has not seen his great-nephew since he was a teenager, told the Post he was smart and liked to read.

Strandlof spent time in prison in Montana on bad check charges and then emerged in Nevada as an advocate for poor children. In the next few years, he became involved in the anti-war movement, served 9 months for possession of a stolen vehicle and became Rick Duncan.