My story is about a cousin of mine that is completing an eight year sentence. Recently, we started compiling my cousins paperwork for his transition. When we tried to apply for new driver's license we found out that his brother had assumed his identity while he was incarcerated.

This is terrible, I feel that a person entering back into society has a hard enough time without his/her identity being stolen. We have a serious situation now, because after reviewing my cousin's credit report, his brother also opened credit cards.

After contacting the credit card companies, they want to prosecute his brother. My cousin is reluctant to do this, because he is afraid other family members will be upset with him.

To all people in this community, please if you are not going to help your family, please don't hurt them, by assuming their identity.

Everyone incarcerated will be released one day.

This is terrible, I feel that a person entering back into society has a hard enough time without his/her identity being stolen.

After contacting the credit card companies, they want to prosecute his brother. My cousin is reluctant to do this, because he is afraid other family members will be upset with him.



That is a terrible situation. I understand that the cousin getting released does not want to see his brother have to be incarcerated like he was, even though it would be well within his rights to bring charges. But, my opinion is that the inmate cousin should not have to suffer for the actions of his brother. Clearly this needs to be straightened out up so that the newly released cousin will be able to rebuild his life without undue complication. That should be the top priority as he is the innocent party here. While I personally would not feel bad about the ID stealing cousin having legal consequences, I do think that the incarcerated cousin should ultimately get to make that decision since he is the victim. One thing I have found is that credit card companies aren't all that interested in bringing charges, they are interested in getting their money. If the cards can be paid off and the accounts closed, they may not press charges. I realize it may not be possible, but an alternative to prosecution may be for the offending cousin to find a way to pay off the cards. I doubt if he will agree to that readily, but when he sees that his alternative is to face charges, he may become very resourceful. As for any family members who may object to the offending cousin having consequences, that would be very unfair to protect him at the expense of the man who has done his time and needs to come out and start over. Perhaps they would like to pay off the cards, if not, they should stay out of it. If I were in your shoes, I would encourage the inmate cousin not to allow himself to suffer consequences for his brother's bad behaviour. I would encourage the offending cousin to try to rectify the situation in our to avoid consequences. Your cousin is fortune to have you helping him deal with this. I certainly hope it works out well for the inmate...after all this is PTO and I am biased in favor of our incarcerated loved ones. Good luck and let us know what happens.