By Chris Parker
Of The Morning Call

Tuesday's front page of an upstate New York newspaper told how the Army pulled a Lehighton college student away from spring break to train soldiers for urban warfare in Iraq. The Daily Star of Oneonta also featured a photo of Robert C. Williams Jr. in his dormitory room, holding his Army-issued M-4 assault rifle, which he told the reporter the Army required him to keep with him at all times. Trouble is, Williams was lying. And not only has his story been exposed as a hoax, but the photo of the 27-year-old triggered a misdemeanor charge of criminal possession of a weapon and his suspension from Oneonta's Hartwick College.

Williams, a 1995 Lehighton Area High School graduate and Hartwick sophomore, served in the Army's 10th Mountain Division Military Police, said a spokesman at Fort Drum in northern New York, where Williams claimed to have instructed the soldiers. But Williams was mustered out in 2001 on an administrative discharge, which is given for misconduct or illness, said the spokesman, Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty. We don't call in civilians to train us in urban warfare," he said. "We are the urban warfare specialists. Williams is a punk who we wouldn't call to do anything. We wouldn't even let him on post." College officials say they don't know what led Williams, who is co-captain and starting center of the Hartwick Hawks football team, to fabricate the story. A woman who answered the phone at >his parents' home in Lehighton and identified herself as his grandmother referred questions to Williams, for whom she gave a New York phone number. Messages left at the number Friday were not returned.

"Rob has been suspended as of Wednesday from the campus," said Rob Clark, the college's executive director of communications. "That means he can't set foot on campus." Authorities say Williams began to knit the tale when he talked at length about his military exploits to Clark. Clark said this week he thought the young man's story merited news coverage, and called a reporter at the Daily Star.

Williams told the reporter that he had mixed emotions about being directly involved in the war, and how "it's the hardest thing in the world as a soldier to send people off to combat when you are not going." "I have established myself away from the military. I have a good start on my new career. But if the military said it would be time to go, I'd never say no." He also told the reporter that men he trained were already in Baghdad, and he was told to expect to train 115 more soldiers in two weeks, and could be sent to war with his students.

The hoax unraveled when a veteran read the story, said Hilferty, the Fort Drum public affairs officer. "A citizen read the paper, called me and said, 'This doesn't sound right,'" Hilferty said. "He was a veteran and asked me to look into it, so I did. This kid got caught because he had a picture of himself on the front page of the newspaper." Police also saw the picture the day it ran, and called the college. A Hartwick official searched Williams' room and found the rifle, which turned out to be an unloaded Bushmaster carbine, not an M-4, Oneonta police Lt. Joseph Redmond said. The gun is a civilian version of the military weapon, Redmond said, and Williams bought it at a gun shop. Other unloaded weapons, including a pellet gun, were found, but no ammunition. The weapons were turned over to police, Redmond said, because it's illegal to keep weapons on campus. Criminal possession of a weapon is punishable by a year in jail and/or a $1,000 fine, Redmond said. College officials said that when they confronted Williams, he confessed to the hoax. Redmond said campus security guards took Williams to the police station Thursday. Besides the criminal charge, Redmond will face disciplinary action by the college. "There will be an internal hearing on his case," Clark said. In the Daily Star story, Williams said he had been a member of the Special Response Team of the Military Police and was honorably discharged in 2000. As an Army reservist, he said he had trained 82 soldiers at Fort Drum for urban warfare in Baghdad during spring break March 24-26. The reporter received a telephone call from a man purporting to be a Sgt. Scott Wildman, who corroborated Williams' story. The man told the reporter that Williams taught soldiers how to enter occupied buildings and how to distinguish civilians from enemies. The man also told the reporter that Williams, whom he described as a firearms expert, had participated in urban warfare in Kosovo. The man turned out to be part of the hoax. "There's a Sgt. Mark Wildman, and he did not speak to this gentleman," Hilferty said. According to the story, Williams wants to be a history teacher and was "hoping to find a job in federal law enforcement." Williams did well in high school, school officials said. He played football for the Lehighton Indians, wrestled, competed in track and volunteered for student groups including Students Against Drunk Driving, Peer Helpers and Stand Tall.

Chris Parker chris.parker@mcall.com