“Everyone believed it”
48-year-old steals her daughter’s identity and lives the life of a young woman
When the police stopped them at a traffic control, they initially denied all allegations (symbol image)
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When she was in her early twenties, she enrolled at university, collected thousands of dollars in student loans, worked in the city library – in truth, she is in her mid-40s. An American woman has admitted to having stolen her daughter’s identity.
She got her driver’s license, went to university, got student loans. A 48-year-old American has admitted to leading the life of a woman half her age for two years – that of her daughter. According to prosecutors, the now 48-year-old has pleaded guilty to identity theft and social security fraud.
The defendant is said to have pocketed thousands of dollars in funding
According to media reports, the story began in Arkansas in 2016. There the defendant applied for a social security card in the name of her daughter, with whom she had no contact. The 48-year-old woman was on the run from local police after allegedly stealing $ 28,000 from an auto repair shop where she worked briefly two years earlier, according to business news website Market Watch. To do this, she had six credit cards issued through company accounts. In this case, too, she later pleaded guilty.
She was only exposed in 2018. She has since lived in Mountain View, a small town in the state of Missouri. The nearby state of Arkansas Police, which were still on the lookout for the woman, informed the city police about the suspect, who lived under false names (and ages). The investigators must have been amazed when they learned that the woman in her forties actually lived in the border town and worked there in the city library. The even bigger surprise: a year earlier, she enrolled at Southwest Baptist University under the name of her daughter. According to the prosecutor, she received $ 9,400 federal student loans, nearly $ 6,000 in educational grants, $ 337 for books and nearly $ 1,900 in other funding.
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Up to five years in prison
“Everyone believed it,” said Chief Jamie Perkins of the Mountain View Police Department in Missouri to the New York Times. She even had friends who believed she was in her twenties. When the police stopped them at a traffic control, they initially denied all allegations. However, when the officers presented the overwhelming evidence of the identity theft, the woman collapsed. “She was only on the run because she was in a domestic violence relationship and had been on the run for years,” said Chief Perkins.
According to federal law, the woman now faces up to five years in prison, according to the prosecutor. According to an order that has already been issued, she must also repay the university and her daughter $ 17,521.
Social security fraud and identity theft are very common crimes in the US, says Nikos Passas, professor of criminology and criminal justice at Northeastern University of the New York Times. From April 1 to September 30 alone, there were more than 270,000 allegations of social security fraud, of which more than 167,000 were classified as attempted fraud.
sources: Western District of Missouri Prosecutor’s Office press release; “New York Times“;”Market Watch“