A year later, the script moved to Washington, D.C., and into the hands of the man who would maintain it for the next four years: Carlos Hernandez.

Carlos Hernandez, Country Officer, September 11, 2021:

“Thanks for the update. I did get the feeling it was a scam. As long as you emailed we did our part. I did make a note on the OIG that it had indications it was a scam.”

Hernandez, who remains a Country Officer in the Office of Overseas Citizen Services, didn’t investigate. He “got the feeling” it was a scam and made a note in the Office of Inspector General system.

Over the following days, Burger provided Hernandez with contact information for Kelvin’s Togolese attorney, who had successfully represented Kelvin in court against the police officer who had held him hostage. Burger explained that, according to Kelvin’s attorney, the embassy had refused to help Kelvin, telling him in the attorney’s presence that “they do not wish to entertain him at all.”

Hernandez asked for Kelvin’s passport number.

Burger explained that Kelvin had already provided his passport and Social Security number to the embassy, and they had refused to help.

Hernandez asked for the passport number again.

That was the last communication from Hernandez until October 17, 2025.

For four years, Carlos Hernandez maintained the “romance scam” script as standing policy.

And when he was unavailable in June 2025, his temporary replacement executed that policy without question.

The Pattern

Five State Department officials. Five years. The same conclusion.

Ambassador Eric Stromayer told Kelvin “Americans aren’t Black” in March 2020 and threatened him with security removal, establishing from the highest level that Kelvin Blas would not receive consular services.

Brian Sells had already dismissed Kelvin as fake in February 2020 using his own grammatical errors as evidence. When presented with evidence that Kelvin was being held hostage and starving, Sells stopped responding. Sells was stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Lomé. He could have walked out of his air-conditioned office and verified Kelvin’s identity in person at any time. He chose not to.

Daniel Neptune reinforced the “West African scammer” narrative in September 2020 without conducting any investigation of his own. Like Sells, Neptune was stationed in Lomé. He could have met with Kelvin, contacted his attorney, verified his military service with a single phone call to the Department of Defense. He chose not to.

Carlos Hernandez “got the feeling” it was a scam in September 2021, made a note in the OIG system, and maintained that position as standing policy through October 2025. He even claimed credit for a temporary officer’s twenty-three-minute dismissal in June 2025.

William Torrance, filling in for Hernandez, conducted that twenty-three-minute phone call and followed the same script without consultation, review, or verification.

• None of them investigated.
• None of them verified Kelvin’s identity with the Department of Defense, which had records of his service.
• None of them contacted Kelvin’s attorney in Togo, who had court documentation of Kelvin’s case.
• None of them explained why an American citizen with a valid passport, verifiable military service, and documented legal representation in Togo would need to be a “scammer.”

For Sells and Neptune, investigation would have required leaving the embassy compound. For Hernandez and Torrance in Washington, it would have required making a phone call.

None of them did either.

They simply followed the script.

And that script was established in March 2020 when Ambassador Eric Stromayer told a Black American veteran that “Americans aren’t Black.”

What followed was five years of bureaucratic language—”romance scam,” “West African fraudsters,” “indications of a scam”—to justify what Stromayer had said explicitly: Kelvin Blas didn’t deserve American protection.

When temporary officers filled in, they executed the policy. When questioned, officials maintained the same position. When the script failed, when Kelvin kept existing, kept surviving, kept asking for help, the embassy escalated.

In June 2025, William Torrance, acting on behalf of Carlos Hernandez, assured David Burger that “the staff of the U.S. Embassy in Lomé, Togo… are now aware of this case, and are standing by to assist Kelvin if he is indeed a U.S. citizen in need.”

Five months later, that same embassy, operating under the same institutional framework, following the same script established when Stromayer said “Americans aren’t Black,” assaulted Kelvin Blas, a veteran of the U.S. Army.

NEXT: Part 3 – The November 11 Assault

How “standing by to assist” became physical violence witnessed by civilians.