Some people will do anything for love. According to court records, an Air Force scientist took his love and devotion to another level by tricking a defense contractor into hiring an unqualified sex worker as a military researcher.
Jim Gord, a senior scientist working for the U.S. Air Force, thought the sex worker was “hot”, which made him put his plan into motion by getting her hired as a contractor at the Air Force Research Laboratory at Ohio’s Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Before taking the steps to get the woman hired, Gord paid for the services of the 32-year-old sex worker using a government credit card.
Sukesh Roy with Spectral Energies was convinced by Gord to hire the unnamed woman in 2017 after he provided a doctored resume that claimed she had a degree in biochemistry, along with other impressively fake qualifications. He spoke highly of the woman’s “technical expertise” and claimed he’d met her on a flight to Washington D.C. He also told Roy she was “also really hot.”
Gord had really met the woman in Cincinnati, where he charged her $400-per-hour rate for sex work on his government travel card so his wife of over 30 years wouldn’t find out. He also kept a spreadsheet on his government-issued computer called “Burner Log” detailing past relationships with a total of 27 sex workers across the United States.
“Many of the 27 women listed on the spreadsheet were foreign nationals from countries considered U.S. national security concerns,” an affidavit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio said.
As for how the scam ended up. The woman was often introduced as Gord’s “research assistant.” He also named her co-chair of a scientific panel of researchers designing turbine engines, detonation engines, scramjets and rockets.
Roy quickly realized that the woman was not up to the task as she “did not fully understand how to use basic word processing and document creation software and struggled to formulate coherent interoffice emails.”
When confronting Roy about the woman’s incompetence in the workplace, Gord spilled his secrets. He told Roy the woman was a sex worker and that he had used his government travel card so his family finances weren’t in jeopardy with his spending.
In 2019, everything came tumbling down when Roy told investigators that Gord had engaged in “unethical government contract negotiations, had communicated threats of violence and was regularly soliciting prostitution while on the installation and while traveling on official US Air Force business.”
Gord was never charged in connection with the warrant prior to his death in September 2021. The sex worker has also not been charged.