A 32-year-old woman is facing charges after she allegedly falsified documents to attend three Boston public high schools for an entire academic year, according to officials and records.
The discovery came after a Boston Public Schools staff member this month noticed discrepancies in the woman’s student paperwork on file and contacted Boston police, according to a letter District Superintendent Mary Skipper sent to parents on June 20.
The woman falsified paperwork to register as a student and attended three different schools under different pseudonyms, Skipper said in the letter.
Detectives investigating the case found several forged documents in the woman’s room that gave authorities «probable cause to believe» that she falsely represented herself to enroll in the Boston Public Schools, according to a police incident report obtained by NBC. News.
The woman used forged Massachusetts Department of Children and Families documents that were signed by a person the agency had no history of employing, according to the police report.
“I am deeply concerned that an adult would break the trust of our school communities by posing as a student,” Skipper said in a statement. «This appears to be an extremely sophisticated case of fraud.»
The woman faces charges of forgery and outright false writing, according to a criminal complaint obtained by NBC News.
She has not been arrested, Boston police said.
It was not immediately clear if the woman had an attorney who could speak on her behalf, and her contact information could not be found in public records.
The woman was a former employee of the Department of Children and Families, according to NBCBoston. The Department of Public Health confirmed to NBC News that the Registration Board opened an investigation into the woman.
This is not the first such incident in recent months.
A 28-year-old woman and her mother in Louisiana were arrested this month after an investigation found the daughter allegedly posed as a 17-year-old student at a high school. In January, a 29-year-old woman in New Jersey was arrested after she allegedly spent four days posing as a high school student.