A 73-year-old American, Randolph Kirk Parker, has been imprisoned for three and a half years, with the final 15 months put on hold, for attempting to secure passports under the identities of two infants who tragically passed away in Ireland in the 1950s. Parker’s actions posed a significant threat to the integrity of the Irish passport system, according to Judge Jonathan Dunphy at Cork Circuit Criminal Court.
In 2017, reports about Parker originally reached the Garda National Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Parker’s 2022 application to renew an Irish passport under the name of Geoffrey Warbrook, a child who died in Ireland in the early 1950s, spearheaded the investigation. Parker was detained at the Cork passport office on September 14th. He appeared there to renew a passport under the name Philip Frank Morris.
Considering Philip Frank Morris as Parker’s true name, he applied for a “fast-track passport” to exit the country. It was later revealed that Philip Morris was an infant who died in Ireland in 1952. Det Garda Hanley revealed that four passport applications had been made under two different identities. He stated that they initially had no idea who the man was.
Investigations were initiated with the help from Interpol, the US Embassy, and Irish and international bodies, and the suspect’s fingerprints were distributed for identification. Eventually, Randolph Kirk Parker was identified from a 1970 Michigan arrest record. Parker had had an Irish passport for three decades and recently acquired a PPS number.
In February, Parker was advanced for judgement after admitting to four instances of supplying incorrect data to acquire passports and one instance of having a fraudulent document. This fraudulent document was an Irish driving licence granted in 2011 under the name Philip Morris.
Detective Garda Hanley informed Judge Dunphy that he had twice questioned Parker, characterising the encounters as ‘odd’ because Parker neither cooperated nor responded to inquiries, though he wasn’t obstructive.
Detective Hanley reported that there was minimal information available about Parker but confirmed that he possessed an American passport in 1999.
“It’s our belief that he first arrived in Ireland in 1988 via Shannon Airport, then journeyed across Europe and resided in Amsterdam. In Ireland, he had VHI and a PO box registered to a Dublin address. He had a wide circle of friends across Ireland, who knew him by a completely different name,” he explained.
Guardian Hanley said that they had communicated with a brother of the late Philip Morris, who passed away at four months old in 1953, and had interacted with family members of Geoffrey Warbrook, who died as a toddler in the early 1950s.
Defence lawyer Brendan Kelly explained that his client sought fraudulent passports after encountering “visa complications” related to his professional ventures. A man acquainted with the Irish passport system provided Parker with guidance, the court was informed.
Mr Kelly portrayed his client as an “amiable, well-spoken, intelligent individual“ who was “easy to interact with”. He noted that Parker’s imprisonment would be challenging due to his foreign citizenship and lack of familial connections in Ireland.
Judge Dunphy identified aggravating elements, such as the time and resources the State had to invest to discover Parker’s actual identity, the betrayal of all those who had known him under a false persona for years, and his lack of cooperation. A mitigating circumstance he outlined was an admission of guilt and the absence of prior convictions.