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Jack Stern's Judo and martial arts fraud was exposed due to his Stolen Valor claims in a court of Law. Presently a few people push the rhetoric that Stern only lied about his military claims and not his martial arts background....nothing could be further from the truth, such rhetoric and diatribe are total lies.
The following article focuses more on the fake Martial arts claims exposed during the case against Stern than his Stolen Valor claims. I have read over the thousands of court documents regarding Jackie Stern, Jack Albert Stern or Papasan Stern. Letters to the judge from family and friends of Sterns, Sterns own letters statements admitted into evidence and court testimony.
I have zero intention of sugar coating Stern's fraudulent Judo and martial arts claims and the reason he did it. The fraud Stern was committing on local Judoka, other martial artists and even on his own students was exposed in court.
Stern didn't have a dojo/school of his own. He taught out a already established Karate school. A school he had gotten into by telling the owner/instructor that he was a Medal of Honor recipient who had learned judo in Japan. Stern then sold these students worthless Judo/Yudo ranks based on the rank the karate students already had.
When caught in lies Stern would tell another lie or become insulted and threatening when people didn't buy his stories. Stern's ever changing stories are what landed him in jail and ultimately in court and convicted.
In May of 1996 Jack Albert Stern was called by the Broward county Sheriffs Office to speak to its employees. Being asked to speak at engagements wasn’t something new for Jack Stern as he had spent the better part of ten years telling people he was a POW, medal of Honor in the war and had trained with the judo masters in Japan.
Stern claimed that through all the years he spent in the armed forces in the Far East, he spent every minute of his free time studying martial arts with the great judo masters of japan. He had been in Judo over 50 years. His son had won an Olympic gold medal in Judo. He headed a Jiu Jitsu system he had inherited and the respected Korean Yudo Association.
Stern walked into the Sheriffs dept sporting his medal and even posing with other law enforcement officers regaling them of stories or his war time exploits. What Stern did not realize was he was about to be arrested....and that there was an FBI agent waiting in another room.
An investigator then showed Stern a copy of his actual military record. Upon sight of his record without even reading it or being questioned, Stern immediately broke down and started crying, wailing and sobbing uncontrollably. In between his inconsolable sobbing, without being asked a single question, Stern told investigators that he had lied about his military back ground and his martial arts back ground because he didn't want people to think he was a loser.
Let that sink in, Stern, had bragged about being a war hero. He had bragged about being stabbed with a bayonet in the gut and remained quiet about it so he called escape captivity as a POW. He had claimed to be a medal of honor recipient. Stern who told people he was a Green Beret, Airborne, Special forces bad ass who had “half a century of judo background training with the great masters of Japan” was sitting in the Broward County Sheriff's Office. When placed under arrest, started crying and sobbing hysterically. Shaking and begging to go home, woefully screaming for his wife, who was not even there, to please come get him. Sterns uncontrollable sobbing and wailing was so loud that it could be heard from the holding cell he was placed in throughout the entire building.
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Stern pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale to wearing a Congressional Medal of Honor without authorization and altering his military discharge papers to obtain military and civilian benefits that he wasn't entitled to. Newspaper articles and people present at the sentencing say that Stern apologized to everyone military, police and to the martial artists he had defrauded.
Last year in September I made the statement in a blog article that I would be releasing Court Documents backing up that Stern himself admitted that he lied about his martial arts background.
It appears that since my article the kontei judo website and Sterns lineage bio page has come down. But according to the now defunct web page;
"Jackie Albert Stern, affectionately known as "Papasan," he started his Martial Arts career in 1947 while in the US Military in Chinhae, Korea, in Korean Yudo under Sensei Tae Ju Chung. After one year, Stern's unit was moved to Northern Luzon in the Philippines where he trained under Berabe Paragas in “Stick Fighting” for 2 years. Then he was transferred again, this time to Okinawa and Japan where he trained under O'Sensei Yamaguchi Gogen in Goju Ryu Karate for 8 months. In Japan, he also trained at the Kodokan under Mifune Kyuzo and earned his black belt in Judo, as well as trained in Kyokushinkai Karate under Grandmaster Mas Oyama at the main Hombu in Tokyo. In 1956, he was discharged from the military and stayed in Japan, living with the Otani Family while continuing his studies in the arts."
https://web.archive.org/web/20221007165210/http://www.konteijudo.com/our-lineage.html
There are more than a few different stories regarding Sterns martial arts claims that are a matter of record.
I am going to compare what Stern had to say about his military service to what is claimed by Gordon.
The story that has been floating around since 2016 comes from Gordon's websites, blogs and social media pages are as follows;
In 2016, four years AFTER Stern passed away this article was on Bret Gordon’s USAMA blog https://web.archive.org/web/20221207065805/http://www.join-usama.com/blog/in-loving-memory-of-papasan-jack-stern
Facebook entry in August 6th 2020
FaceBook entry December 11th 2021
The following article regarding Stern was posted on the USAMA BLOG on 12/27/21
and this one in June of 2022
facebook entry August 13th 2022
Court record – During his court ordered community service part of which he was doing at a VA clinic. It was reported to Sterns probationary officer that the clinic did not want Stern back. He had become a disrupting influence and it was not in their best interest to have him around. Upon being notified of this, Stern wrote a seething letter to the VA clinic, accusing the VA of discriminating against him for not allowing him to continue his community service hours as a volunteer. He claimed to have gone into the military at the age of 16 and where he served three years. He also stated he had worked in law enforcement for 17 years and demanded a apology.
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Apparently his conviction didn't teach Stern a lesson as he resorted to lying again in his letter to the VA. Stern wrote that he was three years active duty.....during that time in history there were only 2 year active terms during wartime and 4 year active terms during non wartime. Stern was never in Law enforcement either. He worked as Bread truck driver until he lost that job and as a polygraph examiner for a company until his stroke in 85.
However, if we are to believe Stern's letter to the VA, he writes that his active military service was only three years. He went in at the age of 16. Stern was born Nov. 9th, 1929. He would have been 16 Nov 9th, 1945. Which means at the latest he would have went in the military from 1945 to 1948 or 1946 to 1949.
The kontei Judo site has Stern being in the military for nine years 1947-1956 and stationed in multiple countries. According to court testimony Stern's children, were born in New York between 1952 and 1956. So Stern obviously wasn't in Japan. During the 50s as was stated on the Kontei Site.
There is big difference between what Stern wrote in 1997 to the VA than what Gordon posted on his various forms of online media.
I think it is pertinent to remind everyone Stern made alot of false military claims AND those stories kept changing and that was what brought him to the attention of local law enforcement which led to his exposure as a fraud, his arrest and ultimate conviction. I always found it odd in his letter pertaining to his community service hours to the VA that he didn't mention teaching martial arts to kids? Helping serve his community through Judo. That is after all what Kano intended his judo to be, a service to one's community. Why wasn't he ordered by the Judge to teach at need or at risk children judo?
Court record - A letter admitted as evidence from a certified law enforcement firearms instructor and Police trainer who knew Stern. Stern had told him that he had "half a century years of judo background studying with the great judo masters of japan" and was a green beret medal of honor winner and retired law enforcement detective.
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The statement made by Mr. Robert, a law enforcement trainer and firearms instructor sheds alot of light on the validity of Sterns Judo claims. Mr. Robert is quite detailed and telling in regards to Jack Stern and how bullying, threatening, abusive and malicious he was.
Direct letters written to the judge by members of Stern’s family talk extensively about Sterns past, his life and his career. Stern who had not graduated high school, worked many years as a bread truck driver, lost his job. Later Stern went back and got his high school diploma and “started doing good”. Stern would go on to become a polygraph examiner for a company before having a massive and debilitating stroke in 1985. By 1996 Paula Stern and Jack stern were married for 45 years. In her letter to the judge, she stated Stern had lost the normal use of his left arm due to his massive stroke in 1985.
It was established that by the 90s Stern had
moved from NY and was living in Florida claiming to be a medal of Honor winner,
a New York city Police detective and a martial arts instructor and Judoka who had “half a century of judo background training with
the great masters of Japan.”
However, there is not a single mention of Stern’s Military or martial arts back ground or involvement in the martial arts in these letters his family (wife and son) submitted to the judge. I can certainly understand the family not mentioning the military stuff, only two reasons not to mention the military.
1.) He did not ever serve in the military
2.) He served but only in the US.
So why did Stern's wife and son leave out his martial arts back ground as an instructor and not mention his Paja Dojo in their statements and letters to the judge or Stern's attorney?
Jack Stern did not found or start the Paja Dojo. He was
never an instructor there. The Paja dojo still existed but under another name
and again not a single record of Jack Stern ever attending the paja dojo for a
single lesson much less starting it.
Stern’s martial arts back ground was a lie, it was fraud, just like Stern’s military service claims.
According to family members Stern couldn't control himself. He was bitter, abusive, bullying and unruly even toward toward his own family. Fighting with even them. Each family member, in those letters to the judge blamed all the fraud that Stern was committing and his behavior on a “massive and debilitating stroke” that he supposedly suffered in 1985. Jack Stern’s son wrote that Stern was “sick in his mind and in health” and asked the judge to be easy on Stern.
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Sterns friends from New York who had known him for more than 25 years wrote letters to the judge as well. They expressed a confusion as to why Stern felt compelled to "inflate his ego and live a lie" upon moving to Florida.
"Regardless of his other training, Judo remained at the core of what Stern taught and pursued. During his lifetime, he was a member of the Armed Forces Judo Association (which later became the USJA), Judo Black Belt Federation of America (which later became the USJF), New York Judo Yudanshakai, Korean Yudo Association, Shufu Judo Yudanshakai and the Kodokan in Japan." https://web.archive.org/web/20221207073536/http://www.join-usama.com/blog/introducing-the-seikan-judo-jujutsu-association
Jack Stern was never a member of any of the organizations Gordon mentions in linked article above......
According to the USJA, formerly the Armed Forces Judo Association, there was no record of
Stern holding any rank or even being a member of The AFJA or The USJA. The only
record of Stern is in 2006 when he submitted falsified Korean documents for
judo rank. The submission of these fake documents subsequently resulted in Stern
being banned for life from the USJA (See email below).
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The United States Judo Federation was formerly the Judo Black Belt Federation (JBBF). The JBBF was organized around regional/local Yudanshakai (black belt associations) two of these regional orgs was the Shufu Yudanshakai and the New York Yudnashakai. The purpose of these regional Yudanshakai was/is to promote judo in their own area. In the 1960s entry into the JBBF was restricted to only Black belt judoka, regional Yudanshakai recognized black belts.
The regional Yudanshukai and the USJF formerly the JBBF keep extensive records of its black belts, members and former members since the inception of the JBBF.
The Hudson Yudanshukai formerly the New York Yudanshukai has no records of a Jack Stern ever being a member of earning a single rank.
The USJF formerly the JBBF also confirmed that no records of rank or even membership can be found on Stern. See emails below.
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An email was sent to the Kodokan along with a screen cap of the stern's supposed Kodokan card Gordon claimed was Stern's. The Kodokan from Japan responded with that there was no record of a Jack Stern ever training at the kodokan. No data could be found by name or birth date or card ID number in thier records.
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| 1st picture: In 1954, Hal Sharpe (circled) won the title as “Japan Foreigner Judo Champion”. The tournament was conducted by Kyuzo Mifune (3rd from left), 10th Dan. Center picture: Chu Kawakami, 9th Dan, and his son Rei Kawakami, 4th Dan, and Hal Sharp (circled), 3rd Dan and Captain of Kawakami’s dojo team. 3rd picture: Shinzo Takagaki and Hal Sharpe (circled). |
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