CATCH HIM IF YOU CAN: THE LIFE AND LIES OF UMAR JOHNSON
by Albert Lanier
In the world of the confidence man, there are reportedly at least two types of what are popularly known as Con Games or Cons which are executed against individuals with the express purpose of depriving them of their money, property and treasure.
The first is the Short con, a performance intended to extract the intended amount of loot from the person or person targeted in a limited amount of time say a few days or a few weeks.
The second is the Long con, an operation usually more ambitious and structured and usually seeking a larger amount of money and resources from individuals over a greater duration of time likely months and years.
If there is a master of the Long con online, it must be Umar Johnson.
Umar Johnson is a self described “nationally certified” African-American psychologist who has been a fixture on You Tube for at least a decade. Numerous videos of his lectures and appearances across the US and in African nations and the UK as well as his interviews on radio and online talk shows can be found on numerous accounts.
Though ostensibly a professional psychologist, Johnson’s lectures and presentations are presented in an overwrought, hectoring, maniacal manner.Johnson seems more like an unhinged motivational speaker than a mental health professional.
In fact, it is difficult to believe that Johnson is a mental health professional upon seeing his interactions with individuals online. When answering questions one-on-one from African-American women (apparently his primary demographic group), he referred to them as “gorgeous” or “beautiful” as a preface to listening to their questions. This is clearly not how any professional psychologist should or does act. This comes off as language more suited to singles bar or dating website than a psychologist and educator.
Speaking of education, Johnson’s main preoccupation over the years has been in raising money for a private school for young African-American males, the FDMG Academy.
A number of you tube creators such as Lenon Honor, Anti-Afro Svengali, Make a Change, E and J have spent months and even years putting out often fairly well sourced exposes of Johnson’s outright dissembling and reassembling of the truth behind his efforts to first buy a school and then finally purchase a facility in Wilmington, Delaware which is reportedly in a neighborhood near brownfields or toxic facilities.
The youtube critics of Johnson have noted that he has been asking for money for his still unopened and nonexistent school since 2009. This would make more than 10 years that Johnson has collected thousands of dollars from vulnerable and hopeful African-American parents who possibly wish to send their kids. Thus, the very definition of a Long con.
Examining Umar Johnson dredges up truth that he likely wishes would lay unexamined or buried such as:
- His claim that he has 6 college degrees including a Ph D. Johnson has claimed to have Bachelors degrees from Millersville University, a Masters degree from Lehigh University and a Ph D from the Philadelphia College of Orthopedic Medicine. Radio talk show host Cynthia Johnson however told Johnson when he was a guest on her show that her research on him found there were no degrees credited to an Umar Johnson.
- His inability to take care of his own children in terms of child support even though Johnson has attacked and belittled African-American parents including single mothers in his speeches and lectures over the years.
- His criminal record which includes charges related to Cocaine.
- His claim that he was related to 19th century speaker and activist Frederick Douglas which was repudiated by the descendants and family members of Douglas.
- His real name is Jermaine Shoemaker not Umar Johnson
And this is probably scratching the surface. There are likely more discoveries to be made about Johnson.
It strikes this writer that what Johnson has done is what any successful con artist does: study and research for his potential “role”and then play it to the hilt by giving the impression of knowledge and professionalism.
One can imagine that Johnson read and stole the rhetoric of Dr Amos N Wilson, appropriated the emphasis on African American boys as well as the occasional suit and tie appearance from Dr Jawanza Kunjufu and mixed it with some of the work of Dr Frances Cress Welsing with an overall emphasis on the ideology of Marcus Garvey.
Then Johnson adapts the style of such researchers as Steve Coakley by larding elements of history and politics in his lectures and talks and blends everything in a stew of Pan-African politics.
The result is a seemingly simplistic but slightly complicated persona which appeals to different sectors of African-American communities. It is no wonder that Johnson retains a certain amount of loyalty despite numerous online exposes of his life and career.
In the end, Johnson reminds of one of an off center, brasher, brusque, egocentric down at his heels version of Mickey Briggs in the BBC series HUSTLE.
Thus one should keep in mind that anytime Johnson appears anywhere including more recently on the Fox Soul channel, the Con is On.
A Retired Journalist and Freelance writer with a 22 year career, Albert Lanier wrote for newspapers like Honolulu Weekly and Pacific Business News, Magazines like Hawaii Magazine and Edible Hawaiian Island and online for Modern Luxury Hawaii’s website during his tenure as a reporter and freelancer.
Lanier currently writes a blog about media issues and current news and events for Medium.com and is a guest on a number of podcasts, talk shows and radio shows.
