Candida L. Gutierrez’s Identity

Candida L. Gutierrez

Candida L. Gutierrez’s Identity

All the while, the crook claimed the real Gutierrez was the one who had stolen her identity. The women’s unusual tug-of-war puts a face on “total identity theft,” a brazen form of the crime in which con artists go beyond financial fraud to assume many other aspects of another person’s life.


“When she claimed my identity and I claimed it back, she was informed that I was claiming it too,” said Gutierrez, a 31-year-old Houston elementary school teacher. “She knew I was aware and that I was trying to fight, and yet she would keep fighting. It is not like she realized and she stopped. No, she kept going, and she kept going harder.”

A 32-year-old illegal immigrant named Benita Cardona-Gonzalez is accused of using Gutierrez’s identity during a 10-year period when she worked at a Topeka company that packages refrigerated foods.





Prosecutors say that the longer a person uses someone else’s identity, the more confident the thief becomes using that identity for purposes other than just working.

Once they have become established in a community, identity thieves don’t want to live in the shadows and they seek a normal life like everybody else. That’s when they take the next step and get a driver’s license, a home loan and health insurance.

“And so that is a natural progression, and that is what we are seeing,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Brent Anderson, who is prosecuting the case against Gutierrez’s alleged impostor.




“It is such a horrible nightmare,” Gutierrez said. “You get really angry, and then you start realizing anger is not going to help. … But when you have so much on your plate and you keep such a busy life, it is really such a super big inconvenience. You have to find the time for someone who is abusing you.”





Citing privacy issues, the Social Security Administration declined to discuss the Gutierrez case. Reser’s Fine Foods did not return a message left at its Topeka plant.
