May 21, 2010 | Impostors in Academia

A flurry of news articles have surfaced regarding the recent revelation that a Harvard student slated to graduate this spring was actually a complete fraud, having fabricated his attendance at MIT, Philips Andover, as well as recommendation letters and SAT scores. What's interesting to think about is that he may very well have managed to pull off his stunt if he hadn't been so greedy about applying for a Rhodes and Fulbright scholarships. It's not to say that he should have, or that it would've been good for him to do so, but it's naïve to think that there aren't others out there who have done the same and gone undetected. I just think that anyone who does ends up losing out somewhere down the line, so it really doesn't bother me that much.

Other recent and interesting cases include:

Esther Reed
School attended: Harvard, Columbia
Time as impostor: 5 years (in academia)
Notable points: used the identity of an acquaintance to get into Harvard, a (still) missing person in order to gain admission to Columbia, and was convicted of mail, wire, Social Security and identity fraud in 2008. She was sentenced to 51 months in prison.
Discovered: February 2008 by a potential employer who realized she wasn't actually a missing person

Azia Kim
School attended: Stanford
Time as impostor: 8 months
Notable points: lacking a cardkey or ID, she had to sneak in and out of her dorm room through the window.
Discovered: May 2007 because dorm staff couldn't find info about her as they were compiling their yearbook

James Hogue
School attended: Princeton
Time as impostor: 2 years
Notable points: went with the alias Alexi Indris Santana and was a member of the Ivy Club and the track team. A documentary titled Con Man would be later made about his exploits.
Discovered: February 1991 by a fellow student from Palo Alto High School, who recognized him

Marilee Jones
School attended: MIT
Time as impostor: 28 years
Notable points: was the former Dean of Admissions at MIT, claimed she had degrees from Union College and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and was legitimately given a Excellence Award for Leading Change for her work in 2001.
Discovered: April 2007 by an anonymous tipster by phone

Akash Maharaj
School attended: Yale
Time as impostor: 1 year
Notable points: won a English department award for a paper, had transferred in from Columbia on false references. He was originally from Trinidad & Tobago.
Discovered: September 2007 after a former boyfriend (who many claim is also a member of the secret Skull and Bones society) reports him for harassment

Also written on this day..

• 2005: metaphors shpetaphors