Last updated:
New York, United States of America (USA)
The Brown & White, Lehigh's student newspaper, reported last month that a police investigation found Anand had falsified admissions and financial aid documents. (representative picture)
Aryan Anand submitted false and forged documents to secure admission to Lehigh University, a private research university in Pennsylvania, for the 2023-2024 academic year
A 19-year-old Indian student arrested and charged with falsifying records to get into a U.S. university will have to return to India under a plea deal with U.S. authorities.
Aryan Anand submitted false and forged documents to secure admission to Lehigh University, a private research university in Pennsylvania, for the 2023-2024 academic year. The Brown & White, Lehigh's student newspaper, reported last month that a police investigation found Anand had falsified admissions and financial aid documents. Reports say he even “faked his father's death” as part of a plot to gain admission and a scholarship.
Anand was arraigned June 12 before Magistrate Judge Jordan Knisley and bail was set at $25,000. He pleaded guilty to one count of forgery. lehighvalleylive.com quoted defense attorney Molly Heidorn as saying that as part of the plea agreement, he was sentenced to one to three months in Northampton County Jail, “which is equivalent to time served.”
As part of the agreement, Anand was required to return to India, and Lehigh chose not to seek approximately $85,000 in compensation. He was released into the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. lehighvalleylive.com reported that Anand created a fake email address posing as the school principal, according to a press release from the office of Northampton County District Attorney Stephen Baratta. The press release stated that Anand's father was alive and in India.
Anand's forgery came to light after he shared a post titled “My life and career are built on lies” on social media site Reddit, prompting an investigation into his case. In that anonymous post, he laid out the details of his fraudulent scheme. Brown and White reports that the investigation began after Reddit monitors notified Lehigh Admissions of the post on April 26.
“The criminal complaint states that the post was written by someone with the username 'u/transportationOK4728' and that the 'creator only followed a Reddit group for a university, Lehigh University,'” the report states. .
Further investigation by Lehigh police identified Anand as the author of the post, which has since been deleted, but in which he outlined his plan. Anand said he “created a false email address in the format principal@schoolname.com for his application, submitted a death certificate for his father to receive additional hardship financial aid, falsified tax documents, altered his The report from Grades 1-3 of secondary school stated that he forged transcripts and created a false “High School Leaving Certificate Examination” to show that he was successful in his final year of secondary school.
Anand said, “This is all about gaining admission to American universities and financial aid.” The federal criminal complaint filed by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania on April 30 charged Anand with violations of forgery, tampering with records or identification, theft by deception and theft of services. regulations.
The criminal complaint states that “metadata shows that death certificates and tax documents were altered by the 'iLovePDF' website and academic documents were altered by Adobe Photoshop.” Anand was arrested and charged with forgery and tampering with records or a second-degree felony for identification, a third-degree felony for theft by deception, and a third-degree felony for saving services.
(This report has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from United News Agency-PTI)
