Two men claim to be the same person, so who is the real Fausto Varela?



RACINE (WITI) -- The case involves two men, one from Racine and the other from southern California, both claiming to be the same person. Now, it's led to a felony charge in Racine for one of the men involved.

Who is the real Fausto Varela? IRS records say it's a man who worked as a cook at the Racine Country Club as early as 2011, but other documents say the real Varela lives in Riverside County, California.

A criminal complaint says the issue stretches back to 2006 when a man in Riverside County filed a complaint saying someone in Racine was using his identity, Fausto Varela born on July 11th, 1962.

In March of 2013 another complaint was filed by the same man in California. The Varela living in Racine was taken into custody and fingerprinted.

That information was sent to Riverside County where investigators found that the Racine man's prints matched arrest records dating back to 2002, all in Wisconsin.

They also found that under those arrest records the alias name of Ignacio Padilla Carrera was mentioned.

A break came April 22nd of this year when Racine investigators received fingerprints from the California man. The comparison showed the sets of fingerprints were from two different people, with the Racine man's prints matching those in arrest records in Racine.

On April 24th, at the Racine Country Club, police re-interviewed the man claiming to be Varela and found that there were outstanding warrants associated with the ID he produced and arrested him.

When police searched him they found four Wisconsin driver's licenses in the name of Fausto Varela, going back to 2000, as well as a permanent resident card.

However, the complaint says the backside of the card looked highly suspicious. He also had a social security card with dashes between the numbers indicating it was not a duplicate card.

The man from California said his wallet had been stolen many years before. Also found in the man's possession were two children's ID cards from Anaheim, California that had names tied to aliases connected to Varela.

Because of this, he was booked into the Racine County Jail under the name John Doe. On Friday, May 16th FOX6 tried to speak with a man at Varela's address who looks similar to the man they're calling John Doe.

The country club says the person known as Fausto no longer is employed there, saying that ended in the last month.

If he is convicted of felony personal ID theft-financial gain, he could face six years in prison as well as a fine up to $10,000 dollars.