Student charged with operating grade fixing scheme

At first glance, a 19-year-old might seem like an unlikely criminal. A school’s salutatorian (a student that has the second-highest marks at graduation) with a 4.54 grade point average, his dream was to become a hedge fund trader after finishing an Ivy league school.

Unfortunately for his aspirations for the future, it turns out that he took a wrong path somewhere along the line.

A student of University of Nevada in Reno, the teenager was the target of an investigation by the Nye County Sheriff’s Office, who suspected him of having gained access to his school district’s computer system and having used that access to raise the grades of a number of his colleagues for a fee.

When the time came to make an arrest, the police found some stolen stuff and equipment for making fake driver’s licenses in his dorm room. His room mate, a 19-year-old, has also been arrested and charged, as well as a third student.

According to PCWorld, additional ten juveniles have been arrested for having profited from the teenager’s offer to bump up their grades, but it turns out that he – somewhat foolishly – chose to make himself the one that profited most from his scheme. In fact, the 4.54 grade point average that made him the school’s salutatorian is the result of his own grade manipulation.

Details about his endeavor are still kept hushed, but it is known that he didn’t hack into the computer system, but obtained the password in an undisclosed way. He has been charged with conspiracy, theft and computer intrusion.