Keith W. Smith Academic Fraud

Keith W. Smith’s Partial Confession to Academic and Professional Fraud

As noted yesterday in an Addendum, to a post on this board, Keith W. Smith confessed publicly to the Academic and Professional Fraud that Crossroad Junction Watch (this blog) has been pointing out for the last several months.  The post was made publicly to his Facebook Page. This is copied directly from his Facebook Page with no additions or deletions except where required by the common indicator < sic >

Keith W Smith

From the Facebook Page of Keith Smith

Confession and Repentance

In recent months, it has been alleged that the doctorates that I claimed were false and the validity of my former qualifications were also questioned.

On Tuesday of this last week, I confessed that the allegations with regard to the doctorates were true. At a difficult time in my life, a friend had forwarded some of my work on a fresh approach to counseling to a university friend of theirs for review. The university friend replied that he thought it was excellent material and deserving of a doctorate. Almost straightaway friends started referring to me as “doctor”, pride got in the way, and the lie was born. As time went by, that lie grew. My previous qualifications also came under scrutiny. Unfortunately one of the institutions were < sic > I studied has been closed for over 20 years and so cannot confirm my three-years study there, and qualifications. It was also said that I was a graduate of Cambridge University, which I didn’t claim, having dropped out of my studies there due to a mental breakdown. I completed my studies elsewhere later.

So in the light of the above I do not feel it right to claim any higher qualifications, as my doctorate/s are nonexistent. I wholly renounce ANY title that I have heretofore used and wish to be referred to simply as Keith Smith.

My repentance is total, and in consultation with my wife Jeanne and trusted friends, I have prayed in confession and repentance to the Lord, seeking his grace and forgiveness.

My wife, Jeanne, had no idea of my lies and had complete confidence in me. I am ashamed of my betrayal of her trust, and that of others who gave me their trust.

I have sinned, I am embarrassed and ashamed. If any of you remember a sin at this time, may you be encouraged by to < sic >passages that are important to me.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11 (KJV)
Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

1 John 1:7-8 (KJV)
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

We have closed down our websites and suspended “Healing Communities”, I have stopped all active ministry for the time being, while I deal with the consequences of my sin and seek restoration.

Should any of you have questions please ask me as, your friend, neighbor or fellow church member will know no more about it than you, only I can answer your questions.

I ask you all for forgiveness and grace, and especially your prayers for both Jeanne and I.

Blessings,
Keith

I’m About Grace

I believe in forgiveness.  I’ve experienced forgiveness.  I’m willing and wanting to give grace and forgiveness to you Keith Smith for my part.  I have several things against you Keith Smith, however, and I’m going to be honest about those too.  Forgiveness is not reconciliation without acknowledgement of what you have done and a willingness on your part to make amends and make restitution.  You have wronged a lot of people, myself included.

I’m also about justice, and I believe that grace and justice in matters like this go together.  What is key to me, and this comes from my own experiences in my past in working with past abuse offenders in different contexts, is that I am fully aware that without complete confession and responsibility, there is no real repentance and no real intent on the part of the offender to change.

Pretending to be a licensed psychotherapist with advertised fraudulent professional and academic credentials is a form itself of abuse to very vulnerable and at-risk people.  It’s not uncommon for people who have been complicit in their abuse of other people, to rationalize, minimize and continue forward with the same sense of entitlement and pride that got them caught in the first place.  I see several such signs of entitlement and self-importance in your confession above however Keith.

I do not know your heart, Keith Smith.  God does and I will leave that between you and Him.  What you have done above is a good start, but no reasonable person can conclude that you’re completely aware, sincere and being totally honest on everything yet, based on what you’ve said above, as I’ll demonstrate below.  I want you and others to know as I write this, that I have some anger going on with this.  You and your wife, along with Jim and Marianne Wright, have been lying about me and others on these and other matters for over a year.  I’ll be switching between speaking in the third person and speaking directly to you.  Despite the anger that I have with this and other situations, I do want to see you restored and healing take place.  Part of that requires straight talk, especially on behalf of others that have been harmed by your actions.

The Fraudulent Doctorate Claims involve far more than Keith Smith’s Pride

Keith’s only confession in this statement is admitting his fraud in presenting himself as having earned not ONE but TWO, doctorates and then beyond that he made the claim of an honorary doctorate.  His explanation is plausible but it begs the question as to why it was necessary in his mind to lie about more than was necessary?  He could have had the title he “renounces” above (and how exactly do you renounce what you never had) with just the lie of one Doctorate.

What Keith doesn’t mention in this is that beyond the matter of deceiving people to massage his ego and his pride to call him “Professor Doctor.” he also presented himself professionally to others and charged them, for teaching, counseling and speaking to conferences based on these claimed degrees. It’s clear he lied as well about past claims of teaching in medical schools while in the US.  It seems highly unlikely as well that Keith Smith would have provided expert witness services in child abuse cases in Spain, the US, the UK or Germany as no court would accept someone without official filed credentials in these matters.  The sheer volume of lies told by Keith Smith here are staggering and no doubt there are more involved than just here.

Keith Smith advertised to the ex-Patriot community in Germany appealing to these degrees as a foundation for charging high fees for an hour for his fraudulent services.  There are people with genuine credentials who charged less.  Some of these proffered services were for real mental and emotional health issues and then even more damningly (in my opinion) for young children who were victimized by different forms of sexual abuse. You harmed children, Keith Smith who were already victimized by others.

People with real problems were cheated and robbed of services Keith Smith was not qualified to give and what is more it’s entirely possible, even probable, that any such treatment Keith Smith provided in these contexts as an untrained provider did more harm than good.  At the very least, Keith Smith should be contacting everyone he ever provided services to and informing them of his fraud, and then advertising perhaps in the same venues where he offered his services to warn people he can’t directly contact who are possibly at genuine risk based on his prior untrained and incompetent care.  There must be a sense of urgency in this I believe!  It is that serious.

This is no time to disappear from sight and give the illusion that you’re contemplating your past sins Keith Smith in comfortable retreat.  You have much to do and much to undo if you’re sincere!

Confessing to pride sounds spiritual and it’s something we all can relate to and are guilty of to various degrees.   It’s the least of what is involved here.  Keith’s sin in this regard was not and is not a victimless crime.  I don’t see very much recognition of this in Keith’s statement.  He seems to bear remorse for his own own shame in being outed and discovered and the pain of his wife and those of his friends and house church that he deceived and that’s all well and good.  Where’s the recognition of real people who relied on his claims for real problems and issues they were facing?

A lot of your language is tellingly passive.  The lie grew?  That makes it sound like it just sort of “happened.”  You made it happen Keith and you went to a great deal of planning to make it happen, and you told more lies and bigger lies all along the way, after you were being called “Professor Doctor.”  You might want to think on that and try on some active verbs somewhere along the way and see how they fit.

Jeanne Had to be Aware of More than what you say here

I find it highly unlikely that your wife wasn’t aware of your fraud in this area, Keith.  You and Jeanne were not married but knew each other during the time when you claimed to have received the Degree from UCLA in 2002.  She served as your administrative assistant and handled correspondence and attempted to make bookings for you in your travels in the early 2000s.  She had to have been aware of more than you’re indicating here and she’s complicit in promoting you and your claims since then.  It’s laudable in one sense that you’re attempting to protect your wife.  It’s doesn’t appear to me however to be the truth, and I have to call you on that as well.

The Claimed Master’s Degrees

Keith still maintains that “Unfortunately one of the institutions were < sic > I studied has been closed for over 20 years and so cannot confirm my three-years study there, and qualifications.”  Unfortunately?  There’s no evidence that I’ve discovered that this “institution” was ever anything more than a Bible Study or Discipleship program run out of another man’s home. 

Any accredited college in the United Kingdom, would have the means to transfer their records of earned degrees to either the accrediting agency or to another designated repository.  It’s clear to me that there is a great deal of rationalizing and an attempt to sound “noble” in foregoing any rights to any titles here, but the fact remains there’s no evidence of any degrees at all!  The claim that records can’t be provided in any form, including the records, diplomas, etc. that would have been given in his time at “Berea Bible School” or “Berea Bible College” (Keith has used both names, which seems odd to me as well) is simply beyond belief and no reasonable person should believe you spent your claimed 3 years getting 2 degrees without one shred of presentable evidence.

The Claimed BA Degree from Cambridge

This is where it becomes clear that you are still lying to others and to yourself Keith when you claim “It was also said that I was a graduate of Cambridge University, which I didn’t claim, having dropped out of my studies there due to a mental breakdown.”

Keith you claimed 3 times in 3 separate places that you were a “Graduate of Cambridge.”  When a website is removed by you, it doesn’t disappear.  There are archives.  I took screenshots of these claims.

Here they are; All 3 claims, of having graduated from Cambridge from 3 different sites, all under the control of Keith W. Smith.

 

 keithwsmith.com
July 2014

 

Keith Smith’s Facebook Profile, July 2014

Keith W Smith, Zoom Account September 2014
User Verified by Keith Smith

Keith Smith, Do you really even have a recognized BA degree from an accredited school?

The only other mentioned academic organization you make mention of in your previous biographies is a “Christian Life College.”  Is this an accredited school?  Does it still exist?  Are records available to support your claim?  What reason does anyone have to believe you on this matter given in your “confession” you outright lie about and ignore your previous 3 claims from 3 different locations on the web?  There’s no reason to believe you even have an earned undergraduate degree from any accredited college, based on this.  Don’t just claim it was another school Keith.  You must give a name, an address, dates and a means to contact the Registrar’s office.  What are they Keith?  Where are they?

I am tired of doing your work for you and I’m not going to do it any more.  If you have a BA Degree, just give the information and then don’t expect us to believe you until we’ve verified it independently.  Get used to that for a while and maybe when we see you’re capable of some truth, we’ll start risking believing you.  In the meantime, there’s no reason to believe you even have a B.A. Degree Keith Smith.  All the evidence points to you being a complete and total fraud with no accredited degree at any level.

The Issues Keith Smith and Jeanne Elder Smith Don’t Address

There is enough above to call the sincerity of this confession into question on it’s own merits but there is so much more that Keith Smith doesn’t address.  I’ll just list them briefly below.  Click the first 2 items to be taken to online evidence of these issues.

1.  Keith and Jeanne Smith’s use of Fake Accounts in Facebook Groups and their Expulsion from Multiple Groups

2. Keith and Jeanne Smith’s support and dissemination of false allegations against multiple others.

3.  Keith and Jeanne Smith’s Slander of Bart Breen in the disseminating of the clear evidence from this Website of Keith’s Academic, Professional Fraud and other offenses.

Facebook removed at least 2 statements from Healing Communities and Keith Smith’s Webpage, accusing Bart Breen of Mental Illness, being an internet troll, lying, and being under investigation by Interpol and local Police in the United States.  These comments, in addition to violating Facebook Community Standards and basic human decency, were false, inflammatory, libelous and designed to harm.  In addition, comments similar to this were made in emails, tweets, and private messaging.  Clearly Keith, you tried everything you could to make this issue about me and when it failed all you were left with was telling the truth as the last resort and you clearly resent me for putting you in that position. I’m fine with that by the way. I’m proud of standing up to you, and showing the world what you’ve done.  I care about people who have been abused by frauds like you and Jim Wright.  If that sounds angry and offends some people, that’s fine with me.  Anger is an appropriate response to what you’ve done.  There are victims here.   Why don’t you look harder and see if you can find some worthy of sympathy Keith?

Wouldn’t a sincere apology on both your parts name the people you harmed, including Bart Breen?

Or, as your comments along with Jim Wright under your confession indicate, are you still holding onto the rationalization that you would have got away with this if only that mean Bart Breen hadn’t dared to research your claims and find out the truth about you?  That whole entitlement and pride thing at work Keith that you confess to above but then try to rationalize now how you’re really a victim.  Real repentance doesn’t look like that Keith Smith.  Take some responsibility for your own actions and apologize for what you did wrong there if you’re really sincere.

Keith Smith I’m willing to extend Grace to you and Work with you

You state Keith Smith, “Should any of you have questions please ask me as, your friend, neighbor or fellow church member will know no more about it than you, only I can answer your questions.”  Sadly this is a complete delusion on your part Keith.  Are you kidding me?  You’re the last person anyone should come to ask questions about this! 

Here I’ll allow myself some more anger and hope maybe you’ll wake up.

Hello! You’ve lied for 40 years or more!  You’ve lied to your wife!  You’ve lied to your family and friends!  Your word Keith Smith is worth nothing at the moment and it’s going to take time to repair that!  There may be a time for you to ask for people to come to you and trust you, but it’s a long way down the road and not something you have any business asking for after you’ve just admitted you’re an academic and professional fraud on this grand of a scale and then just lied within your confession itself.

Come Clean All the Way Keith W Smith!  I’m cheering for you.  I really am.

I may be wasting my anger, but there are some things worth getting angry about and this qualifies.

Keith, please think more about what you’ve done and who’ve you harmed.  For some reason, I think there may be some hope for you.  This is familiar territory for Jim Wright.  I don’t think he even feels any empathy for others and that’s part of his compulsion to repeat this behavior.  Maybe you Keith, are looking for the first time from a place where you can really see what you’ve done and who you have hurt with your lies.  Real people paid you and trusted you to give them something you lied about being able to give them.  I think that’s sad and I’m angry about it.

I hope for your restoration, but first you need to really see what you’ve done and take responsibility for all of it.  You can count on me, whether you welcome it or not, to call you on it moving forward until you take responsibility and do something about it

I’ve reached out to you privately and you haven’t responded.  That’s your choice.  As long as that remains the case, I’ll continue to use this venue to address the situation, as long as I believe there are people who have been harmed by you and who need to be alerted to the danger you represent in terms of your past or any future services.  Until I am convinced by more than your words, and shown by your actions, that you’re committed to doing all that is right and needed in this situation, I will continue to address it publicly.