Texas A&M's No. 3 administrator presented himself as a warrior-scholar: A former Navy SEAL with a doctorate from Tufts University.
But records obtained by The Eagle indicate Alexander Kemos never was part of the elite fighting force, and Texas A&M officials confirmed Friday that he doesn't have a doctorate or even a master's degree, which was a posted requirement for the $300,000-a-year position that serves as the top adviser to Texas A&M President R. Bowen Loftin.
On Friday morning, the day after he was confronted with questions about his background by Loftin in Maine, where the pair were vacationing, he resigned.
"It's a human tragedy," said Jeffrey Seemann, Texas A&M's vice president for research and the chair of the search committee that selected Kemos, who lives in College Station and has a wife and three children.
In a message to the campus Friday afternoon, Loftin said Kemos will no longer serve as senior vice president for administration, effective immediately. He said Kemos cited "a desire to spend more time with his family."
He later released a statement through his spokesman that said "we expect nothing but the highest principles from our administrators."
"Upon learning of questions into Mr. Kemos' background, I immediately contacted the Office of General Counsel and initiated an investigation for verification of his credentials," the statement said. "Last night, I confronted Mr. Kemos about these questions regarding his background, and he confirmed several misrepresentations related to his academic degrees and military service."
Since all Navy SEALs have tridents, some government officials and military watchers said Kemos violated the federal Stolen Valor Act, which bars false claim of military decorations or honors. The misdemeanor is punishable by up to a year behind bars, but is generally only prosecuted in egregious cases.
Kemos did not return messages seeking comment.
He had come to Texas A&M in 2009 from the business world, having served as executive vice president for corporate development and founding partner at Nordic American Group, based in Dallas and Oslo, Norway.
'Never a SEAL'
In his biography, resumé and introductions at university events, Kemos has claimed he was a SEAL.
No one with the last name Kemos has ever attended Basic Underwater Demolition/Seal training, said Cmdr. Greg Giesen, a public affairs officer with the Naval Special Warfare Command.
"If a person has not graduated from BUD/S, they are not and were never a SEAL," he wrote in an e-mail to the newspaper. "Any claims that their names are withheld because all their missions were 'Top Secret' or 'of course they won't confirm my service, it's classified' is all Hollywood pop-fiction."
Kemos wrote he was a SEAL Team 2 platoon leader and operations officer. He wrote that he was a graduate of Class 93. The entry was under the dates January 1982 to May 1987.
Class 93, however, graduated in August 1977, said Tom Hawkins, founder of the Naval Special Warfare Foundation, who has access to a comprehensive SEAL database. He also said he could find no record of Kemos' service at any time.
According to a letter from the Military Personnel Records division of the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, officials there conducted "extensive searches" of every records source available to them.
"However, we have been unable to locate any information that would help us verify the veteran's military service," the letter stated.
No master's or doctorate
Kemos' hiring at Texas A&M as associate executive vice president for operations was announced in February 2009 by administrator H. Russell Cross, who referred seven times to "Dr. Kemos" in an e-mail to the campus, detailing that he received his master's and doctorate from the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.
In March, Loftin announced that Kemos had been selected as senior vice president for administration, overseeing non-academic operations such as facilities, business auxiliaries, university police and risk and compliance. Loftin also referred several times to "Dr. Kemos."
According to the Massachusetts school, Kemos was enrolled as an international relations major in the master's law and diplomacy program from September 1987 to May 1989, and the doctoral program from September 1990 until December 1994, but did not complete either program's requirements.
"[He] has therefore not earned those degrees," stated a letter dated June 10 from registrar assistant Michael Yarsky.
At Texas A&M, like the University of Texas at Austin, degrees are verified for faculty, but not for staff and administrators like Kemos.
Loftin has asked Cross to serve as acting senior vice president for administration in the interim. Cross has known Kemos for 12 years, and supervised him when he first started at Texas A&M.
"Alex is a very intelligent individual and a very outgoing individual," Cross said. "He was a friend, and he still is."
Related links:
Some applicants' degrees aren't verified, officials say
A&M administrator lied about military service
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