SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – A 59-year-old Utah man who wrote his own obituary before he died last week used the opportunity to come clean.

Friends and family of Val Patterson learned Sunday that the man they thought held a doctorate from the University of Utah received the degree thanks to a paperwork mistake and that he never even graduated.

Patterson died from throat cancer on July 10. KSL-TV reports he wrote his own death notice in the first person last fall.

The light-hearted obituary published in the Salt Lake Tribune also includes a confession to stealing a business’ safe. He wrote: “As it turns out, I AM the guy who stole the safe from the Motor View Drive Inn back in June, 1971.”

His widow, Mary Jane, told KSL-TV the confessions are true.

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Information from: KSL-TV, http://www.ksl.com/

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.