FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. — Mason Wollersheim’s fall from Special Forces staff sergeant to military prisoner was already dramatic. Then he tried to climb his way out.
A photograph published on social media in May 2025 appeared to show Wollersheim folded over the top of a chain-link fence at Fort Leavenworth, his body caught among coils of razor wire as uniformed personnel worked to pull him down. A military police vehicle sat below, its emergency lights washing the scene in red and blue.
At the time, the claim accompanying the photograph was not officially confirmed. The post said Wollersheim, a former Soldier with the 10th Special Forces Group, had attempted to escape from Leavenworth.
More than a year later, an Army court-martial result confirmed that Wollersheim attempted to escape military confinement.
On July 21, 2026, a military judge at Fort Leavenworth convicted Wollersheim after he pleaded guilty to attempted escape from confinement, attempted escape from custody and resisting apprehension.
The judge sentenced him to 28 months in confinement and a bad-conduct discharge.
Wollersheim was acquitted of conspiracy and assaulting a person carrying out law-enforcement duties. The Army’s public summary does not explain how the escape unfolded or confirm that the photograph shows the exact incident prosecuted at trial.
The docket now identifies Wollersheim as a private first class. Less than two years earlier, he had been a staff sergeant assigned to Delta Company, 2nd Battalion, 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne).
By the time he returned to court at Fort Leavenworth, the Army identified him simply as an inmate.
Wollersheim initially pleaded not guilty during a March 11, 2026, hearing and requested trial before a panel that included enlisted members. The case later shifted to a guilty plea before a military judge. Trial dates in May were postponed before the case was resolved July 21.
The Army has not yet released enough information to explain how Wollersheim got out of secure confinement, how far he made it or what happened when military police caught him.
His new sentence adds another 28-month term to his military justice record, but it should not automatically be reported as giving him a combined 56 months. The public court result does not say whether the new sentence will be added to the first sentence or overlap with it.
Wollersheim was at Fort Leavenworth because of a separate court-martial held at Fort Carson, Colorado.
On Jan. 31, 2025, an enlisted panel convicted him of broadcasting an indecent recording, three attempted larcenies, wire fraud and larceny. He had pleaded not guilty.
Wollersheim was sentenced to 28 months in confinement, reduced from E-6 to E-4 and given a bad-conduct discharge. He received five days of confinement credit.
Those convictions came from two very different chapters of misconduct: a volatile confrontation involving his estranged wife and another Soldier, and a series of fraud schemes involving insurance companies, luxury property and photographs allegedly reused to support conflicting claims.
The video case began on the morning of Jan. 30, 2021, in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
According to Wollersheim’s appellate filing, he entered the darkened bedroom of a home he had shared with his estranged wife while recording with his cellphone. Inside, he found another Soldier in bed with her.
The roughly 52-second video captured Wollersheim confronting the pair, demanding the other man’s name and rank, searching clothing beside the bed and retrieving the man’s military identification card.
Wollersheim filmed the identification card, read the Soldier’s name and rank aloud and told him his career was over. Later that day, he sent the recording to four people through Facebook Messenger.
Prosecutors charged Wollersheim with both making an indecent recording and distributing it. The panel reached an unusual split decision: it acquitted him of making the recording but convicted him of broadcasting it.
That distinction is now part of Wollersheim’s appeal.
His attorneys argue that the video did not clearly show the other Soldier’s genitalia, buttocks or another body part covered by the military’s definition of a “private area.” The defense said the man appeared in the recording for only about six seconds as he rose from the bed and attempted to shield himself.
Several people who saw the recording reportedly could not confirm that it showed genitalia or other explicit imagery.
Prosecutors attempted to introduce a digitally enhanced version of the video that increased the brightness and changed the playback speed. The military judge excluded it, finding that the altered footage could give the panel a different visual experience from what Wollersheim saw while making the recording.
The panel nevertheless found that Wollersheim committed a crime when he sent the recording to other people.
He was acquitted of extortion and assault stemming from the broader domestic incident. A false-statement charge also ended in a not-guilty finding.
The fraud investigation involved a collection of expensive property that allegedly changed identity or value depending on which company was being asked to pay.
Wollersheim was convicted of attempting to steal more than $1,000 from USAA General Indemnity Company in December 2021 and more than $1,000 from State Farm Fire and Casualty Company in August 2022.
He was also convicted of attempting to steal money from Pinnacol Assurance in April 2023. The panel found that the attempted theft involved money of some value but did not find that prosecutors proved it exceeded $1,000.
Wollersheim was separately convicted of wire fraud and stealing money from the United Parcel Service.
Army prosecutors said investigators found some of the same photographs being used in different insurance claims to represent different items or values.
One photograph was allegedly offered to USAA as proof that Wollersheim owned a Rolex Yacht-Master II. Prosecutors said the same image was submitted to State Farm in connection with a different watch.
A necklace shown to USAA was described as a Kay Jewelers gold Cuban curb chain. In the State Farm claim, the same photograph allegedly represented a 14-karat gold chain.
A ring reportedly underwent a similar transformation, appearing in one claim as a diamond ring from Kay Jewelers and in another as a wedding ring.
Investigators also examined an insurance claim involving a binocular night-vision device that Wollersheim said was lost during personal travel to Türkiye.
When asked why he brought night vision equipment on vacation, Wollersheim reportedly said he was a Special Forces Soldier and always needed to be prepared. He maintained that the device was his personal property and did not belong to the military.
Prosecutors said his commander confirmed that Wollersheim had no official reason to carry the equipment and had not traveled to Türkiye or Armenia on military orders.
Another part of the investigation involved antique silver.
According to prosecutors, Wollersheim filed a Colorado Springs police report claiming approximately $36,420 in antique silver serving ware had not been delivered. The report was intended to support a claim involving UPS.
Investigators also learned that Wollersheim had told State Farm that silver decorative pieces were lost from his luggage while he was traveling in Armenia.
Not every allegation raised during the investigation became a conviction, but the panel found Wollersheim guilty of the attempted larceny, wire fraud and UPS theft offenses at the center of the case.
His first court-martial sent him to military prison. His second came from what he did after he got there.
The result now confirms that a former staff sergeant from one of the Army’s best-known special operations formations attempted to escape confinement and resisted the personnel trying to apprehend him.
The social media photograph may eventually become the defining image of the case: an alleged former Green Beret suspended over a military prison fence, razor wire wrapped around the route he had chosen out.
Additional court records could reveal whether Wollersheim planned the attempt, whether anyone helped him and what happened between the moment he left secure confinement and the moment military police brought him back down.
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