Join me to hear how Jesse Kipf faked his own death to avoid paying over $116k in child support! This is eCrimeBytes Season 3, Episode 15 – Dad Fakes Death To Stay Deadbeat.
Sources:
- https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68015322/united-states-v-kipf/
- https://www.justice.gov/usao-edky/united-states-v-jesse-kipf-623-cr-60-rew
- https://nypost.com/2024/04/07/us-news/kentucky-dad-jesse-kipf-faked-his-own-death-to-avoid-paying-more-than-100k-in-child-support-faces-lengthy-jail-time/
- https://www.insideedition.com/jesse-kipf-dad-child-support-payments-fake-death
- https://www.klkntv.com/lpd-two-arrested-intercepted-fedex-package/
Transcript:
00:00:00:00 – 00:00:26:41
Keith
What’s up, you crazy bastards? Welcome to another episode of eCrimeBytes. This is where I research the court documentation and roast the criminals so you don’t have to. All right. This episode is dad fakes death to stay deadbeat. All right, so who do you see on your screen right now? This is Jesse Kipf, and his last name is spelled k i p f.
00:00:26:46 – 00:00:32:22
Keith
I’m just going to call him Jesse from now on because we’re close. We’re definitely close. We’re on a first name basis with each other.
00:00:32:22 – 00:00:36:16
Keith
And today he’s about 38, 39 years old.
00:00:36:16 – 00:00:56:35
Keith
So the picture on the left that is Jesse back in 2010. And the picture on the right is Jesse now. Okay. And you know how this works, right? We’re going to turn these mug shots into a puppet. And we’re going to act out the rest of this episode. So with that, hah hah hah all right.
00:00:56:40 – 00:01:03:10
Keith
Pretty cool huh? All right. Well, this one over here, I mean, he just looks completely high, right?
00:01:04:28 – 00:01:23:58
Keith
And then this one over here. I have to laugh because he just looks completely shocked. I don’t know, someone must’ve surprised him when they took his mug shot on this one. But he looks so shocked, I was like, this has got to be our main character throughout this episode. So follow me and let me tell you about Jesse’s first crime.
00:01:23:58 – 00:01:52:07
Keith
Now we’re in Lincoln, Nebraska. It’s September 14th, 2010. All right, so this lady here. She’s a victim. Okay. She was staring out her window and she noticed something strange. You see this red car over here? It’s been parked in front of her house for over an hour. And you know, if you’re familiar with old ladies at all, you know they’re pretty much the security camera of the neighborhood, right?
00:01:52:08 – 00:01:54:44
Keith
So she knows that this car doesn’t.
00:01:54:44 – 00:02:08:44
Keith
It just doesn’t belong in the neighborhood. It doesn’t belong in front of her house. Right? So then Fedex shows up.
00:02:08:49 – 00:02:35:32
Keith
So the Fedex driver is now there, and two people get out of this car. You may ask yourself, who are these two people? Well, the first is Jesse, when he was 25. And now we also have a new criminal. Her name is Persephone Nguyen. And I’ll spell it for you, because I probably murdered the last name. It’s spelled n g u y e n.
00:02:35:36 – 00:02:42:02
Keith
And she was 20. And I have a picture of her. Check her out. Holy shit. You’re a child.
00:02:42:02 – 00:02:45:38
Keith
Jesse, you picked a child to do your crimes with you.
00:02:45:38 – 00:02:57:24
Keith
She looks like she’s about seven. I don’t even know how this happened. Okay, well. All right. So the old lady noticed that these two got out of the car and approached a Fedex driver.
00:02:57:32 – 00:02:58:20
Keith
And so she said,
00:02:58:20 – 00:02:59:20
Keith
this is weird.
00:02:59:20 – 00:03:20:56
Keith
And she went outside, and then she noticed that they were trying to sign for a package that was addressed to her husband. And you’re probably asking yourself, what is her husband look like? I mean, if this lady is standing here with two thumbs up and she is the security camera of the community, you gotta wonder what her husband looks like, right?
00:03:21:02 – 00:03:52:38
Keith
Well, I have a picture of him too, check this out. Yeah. look at the eyebrows of that son of a bitch. Oh my God. Yeah. So this is her husband that this package was addressed to. Okay. So at some point, the Fedex driver saw this commotion of the lady coming out of her house. And this weird scenario of two people sitting in a car and then coming out wanting to sign for a package, and she was like,
00:03:52:38 – 00:03:53:51
Keith
ahhh nope.
00:03:53:56 – 00:03:55:02
Keith
Fuck that.
00:03:55:02 – 00:04:05:33
Keith
And took the package back. So what happened? Jesse and Persephone took off.
00:04:05:38 – 00:04:37:09
Keith
And you can imagine when they took off. Well, the old lady over here, she saw their license plate. And since she had their license plate, she could call the authorities later on to report them. And this package, which eventually was opened to figure out, you know, what it was that they were trying to sign for. Ended up having two radar detectors in it, and together they cost over $850.
00:04:37:14 – 00:04:40:44
Keith
And I thought to myself I was like, radar detectors. Are those even a thing anymore?
00:04:40:44 – 00:05:11:42
Keith
That is definitely 2010 right there. Right. So what happened was this pair, Jesse and Persephone, they used one victim’s Wells Fargo account to pay for these radar detectors. And then they shipped it to this other victim’s address and this victim that we see on our screen right now, that’s the one that caught them by writing down their license plate and reporting to the police.
00:05:11:47 – 00:05:14:50
Keith
So you can imagine the police, they caught them
00:05:14:50 – 00:05:25:30
Keith
shortly after. I think it was that night or like that next day. It was pretty pretty quick. And this made the old lady happy.
00:05:25:35 – 00:05:45:00
Keith
And so at that point, that’s the first time I saw that the law dealt with Jesse. Okay. So the second time it comes 13 years later. So join me in 2023 in a nice Hawaiian Paradise next.
00:05:45:00 – 00:06:16:06
Keith
Ha! Ha! Ha! I bet you didn’t expect this as your Hawaiian Paradise, did you? All right, well, first I got to give you a little bit of information. Okay. Jesse here. Yes, yes, this is Jesse. This is Jesse, 13 years later. You’re looking a little rough there, Jesse, aren’t ya? All right, so, Jesse, he owed over $116,000 in child support, so he decides he just doesn’t want to pay it.
00:06:16:11 – 00:06:44:16
Keith
And how does he get around not paying it? Well, on January 20th, 2023, he is able to access the Hawaii Death Registry system as a real doctor living in another state. So I don’t know what the doctor looks like. So I made one. And here he is. This is the doctor. Uh he looks pretty aggressive, doesn’t he?
00:06:44:31 – 00:06:44:46
Keith
Check
00:06:45:22 – 00:06:48:52
Keith
Oh my God. Oh that’s aggressive.
00:06:48:52 – 00:07:20:07
Keith
All right so what happened is Jesse made an electronic case for his own death. Okay. For Jesse, not the doctor. For Jesse. But he did it as the doctor in this system. All right, this all happened on January 20th of 2023. Now, the very next day, on January 21st, he assigned that doctor, the credentials of the person that he’s using, as the medical examiner in his death.
00:07:20:11 – 00:07:45:55
Keith
And then he took that doctor’s credentials and he certified his death, Jesse’s death, using that doctor’s credentials. So what happened was Jesse to the government, now is listed as dead. Okay. And this listed Jesse as dead in many government databases that were attached to this. It’s just one of those things where once it gets updated, the next system updates and so forth.
00:07:45:59 – 00:08:11:37
Keith
And I guess he also repeated this process not just for Hawaii, but he did it in other states too, to really make sure that people thought he was dead. The whole reason for doing this was just not to pay child support. So he was trying to get out of $116,000 in child support, and then he goes and tries to alter electronic records to make it look like he’s dead.
00:08:11:42 – 00:08:23:00
Keith
Okay, well, you know, this isn’t the only thing that Jesse has done when it comes to illegal computer things. Follow me and let me tell you a little more about some computer fraud.
00:08:23:00 – 00:08:51:04
Keith
So crimes don’t usually happen in a vacuum. And Jessie here, he did more. He did a lot more. He performed some ID theft, and he stole credentials for real people from a couple victim companies. Now, these two companies I’m going to talk about, they’re in the hotel entertainment and marketing industry. So imagine things like the TVs and hotel rooms and ads and all that kind of stuff.
00:08:51:17 – 00:09:21:28
Keith
Sounds like Wi-Fi too from what I’m about to tell you. Now, who were the two companies? Now, the very first company was called Guest-Tek Interactive Entertainment Limited. So I looked them up on Google for you, and this is what their Google landing page looks like, where it lists their map and everything. And immediately I said, Holy shit, why does this company have only 2.5 stars out of five?
00:09:21:32 – 00:09:41:51
Keith
So the researcher me, I had to know, right? I had to know. And I’m sure you had to know too. So I looked at a couple reviews real quick here and I saw so many bad ones. You know Adam Smith, he says Raju and manager Aditya is useless. Been on call for over three hours trying to fix our Wi-Fi.
00:09:41:51 – 00:10:06:22
Keith
They can’t even send out a technician. Man, that sounds horrible, Adam. Now remember that name, Aditya. Because I’m going to come back to it. Now. Seth. Seth says I had no reason to know this company’s name before having such an awful time using a TV in my hotel room. What utter garbage. Now, I got to say, I don’t know this company’s name either until I saw them in the court documentation.
00:10:06:27 – 00:10:26:32
Keith
So, yeah, it’s kind of surprising to find out that there’s a lot of people that don’t like them. And here’s a couple of my favorites. One that says it’s like not having internet at all. And I thought that was almost the the sickest burn out of all of them. And then this other one from David says, worst company to work for.
00:10:26:37 – 00:10:50:21
Keith
Stay away. Okay. So we seen this from all aspects, right. Customers and employees. Well obviously there are two plants in there and I’m pretty sure the managers made their employees go, go make these, uh reviews that are all five stars, not even just five stars in Google system, but they actually put the emoji of five stars in here.
00:10:50:26 – 00:11:22:59
Keith
And the first one is an employee. And they say Guest-Tek provides an exceptional workplace experience, especially in the media platform. The support of Indian management fosters a positive culture, hosting motivational speech and offering great learning opportunities. My line manager’s guidance is invaluable. And the cooperative leaders prioritize employee well-being. With a strong business presence in top hotels worldwide, Guest-Tek stands out as a five star employer.
00:11:23:04 – 00:11:45:02
Keith
Each day brings new opportunities for growth and fulfillment, making it a fantastic place to work. And then five emoji stars. And I thought, oh my God, you are putting your real name in here writing this because you’re hoping for some kind of raise, right? And then the other person says, Guest-Tek is such an amazing company. Our superior staff is also great.
00:11:45:07 – 00:11:57:22
Keith
Great thanks to Aditya to being a wonderful manager. So this person also put their name in and I’m not going to give them all this credit, because I’m pretty sure both of these individuals are looking for some kind of raise, right? I mean,
00:11:57:22 – 00:12:05:49
Keith
they mentioned the person that the customer previously just burned, basically. So I bet you Aditya,
00:12:06:03 – 00:12:14:22
Keith
probably right next to this person with a gun next to their head and is like, you better fill out a Google review for me because this is this is killing me over here.
00:12:14:22 – 00:12:25:04
Keith
All right. And so then I looked up Milestone Inc, and I just want you to feel assured. Milestone. They had a five out of five stars with one Google reviews, so I’m not even going to bother taking you down that tangent.
00:12:25:09 – 00:12:29:28
Keith
It’s only going to be the negative ones because the negative ones are often, there always the most interesting right?
00:12:29:28 – 00:12:36:15
Keith
Okay. And with that join me now because I’m going to talk about how the law caught up with Jesse.
00:12:36:15 – 00:13:15:13
Keith
Okay, so a lot of the court documentation was actually sealed in Jesse’s case. I don’t know why. There was no reason really given in the public court documents that I could get to. But I do know that the indictment came down October 26th, 2023, and it was pretty heavy. Okay. Counts one through five were accessing a computer without authorization, count six through eight ID theft and then counts nine through ten, opening fraudulent credit cards with a false social security number, which is like a false statement type of thing.
00:13:15:13 – 00:13:37:18
Keith
And if you looked at all his penalties and you add them up, it ranged anywhere from 2 to 30 years in prison. So that’s quite the swing here. I mean, he could be looking at a couple of years, or he could be looking at a big chunk of his life if they actually throw 30 years at him. I personally don’t think they’re going to throw 30 years at him, but we’ll see.
00:13:37:19 – 00:14:18:01
Keith
Right. So he’s also on the hook for at least $195,000. Okay. This number comes from the victims in this case. And there was one victim that was the Hawaii Department of Health. They had a loss of about $3,500. Milestone, Inc., that one company that I told you about earlier had a loss of about $56,000. And GuestTek, the one with Aditya and all the managers and all the crazy Google reviews, they reported a almost $20,000 loss.
00:14:18:01 – 00:14:45:23
Keith
And then you had his child support. And that was the lion’s share of all this. It was over $116,000. So when you add all that up, it comes out to almost $200,000. That’s what he’s on the hook for. So in this indictment, they also said all the stuff that they want him to forfeit. And it was just a ton of computer shit because he used computers to commit his crimes.
00:14:45:28 – 00:15:08:36
Keith
And then they were very specific about this, and I didn’t even think this was a thing. But gold and silver coins. Now you look at Jessie and you think, yeah, yeah, I can see this guy squirreling away a bunch of gold and silver coins. How much do you think this guy squirreled away? Well, according to the court paperwork, it was over $16,000.
00:15:08:36 – 00:15:17:07
Keith
So the government wanted that to go towards all that restitution that I just told you about with those four victims earlier.
00:15:17:07 – 00:15:35:55
Keith
So Jesse pleads guilty on March 29th, 2024, shortly before his trial. Like a couple of weeks before his trial, there was one count. Count number two. Accessing a computer without authorization. That’s one that he said he was guilty of. And the other was count seven, ID theft.
00:15:35:55 – 00:15:49:11
Keith
So because of that plea, prosecutors are recommending that he serve seven years out of that total of a possible 30 that I told you about earlier. So seven years. That’s still a pretty stiff sentence, right?
00:15:49:13 – 00:15:53:31
Keith
Seven years is a long time. If you think about it in prison terms.
00:15:53:31 – 00:15:56:40
Keith
So now we wait. We wait to see what his prison sentence is.
00:15:56:51 – 00:16:03:46
Keith
So follow me now, and I’m going to take you to my last few thoughts on this case and get you out of here on a good note.
00:16:03:46 – 00:16:25:58
Keith
Okay. Welcome to the last stop in this case. Before we get anywhere, please down here, click like and subscribe. I would appreciate that so much. Now, if you have a friend or family member that you know likes podcasts like this, please do share it with them. With that out of the way, my one main thought on this case is this guy.
00:16:26:03 – 00:16:52:50
Keith
He had $100,000 worth of child support that he owed, and that’s a lot of money, right, to skip out. How did somebody let him go so far as to owe a $100,000? And then for him to to somehow gamble for $100,000, to fake his own death, not just leave for a little while, but fake his death to not pay it.
00:16:52:50 – 00:17:21:59
Keith
That was above and beyond, right? I mean, that’s the reason why I had to bring you this case. But the big thing here is, in the end of the day, when they caught him, not only does he have to pay the 100k he owes, but now he has to pay at least three other victims, which made his 100k bill go up to about 200k, so I can’t imagine if he had trouble paying this prior, how he’d be able to pay double this amount after his crimes.
00:17:22:03 – 00:17:27:26
Keith
So like I said earlier, we don’t know what his sentence is yet. This case is really, really fresh. He said I was guilty of it.
00:17:27:26 – 00:17:40:53
Keith
I think they’re probably going to give what the prosecutors asked for, probably around seven years, give or take. I’d say somewhere between the 5 to 10 years. I’m curious what your guess is going to be on the sentence.
00:17:40:53 – 00:18:07:24
Keith
So put your guess in the comments. And hopefully somewhere down the line, once I see the sentencing happen, we’ll look and we’ll see who is the closest. Right. All right. So is she gone? Is she gone? Oh okay. Listen, I know, I know most of my episodes an act up up until this point, but I can be pretty assured that my wife is not watching this episode all the way to the end.
00:18:07:24 – 00:18:29:44
Keith
So this is the point where I can actually make all my jokes about wanting to fake my own death to get away from my wife, Andrea, right? Right? Nah. It would have been way too easy. That’s why I just didn’t this whole episode. But. But I did have to put the S.O.S. about my wife in now at the end of this episode, because I was assured that she would not be watching this late.
00:18:29:48 – 00:18:36:26
Keith
And if you haven’t figured out, I’m very scared of her. I am very, very scared of this woman. So if you see her show up,
00:18:36:26 – 00:18:47:39
Keith
I’m terrified of her at the same time. Okay, so with that, I hope you come back and you join me next episode because I’m going to pick another crazy, bonkers case just like this.
00:18:47:44 – 00:19:07:46
Keith
And we’ll walk through it with the criminals and have a little bit of fun. So see you then. Thanks.
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