8 Charged in Complex Test Cheating Scheme
An Arcadia man and seven other people were indicted in New York on Tuesday for an alleged scheme that allowed students to cheat on graduate school admissions tests by using pencils secretly encoded with the answers.
The students, trained to read the code, used the pencils as they took the Graduate Record Exam (GRE), Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT) and Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL), prosecutors said.
A 71-count indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court charged Po Chieng Ma and the seven others with one count of conspiracy and 70 counts of mail fraud.
Under the scheme, expert test-takers would take the exams in New York City and, relying on the three-hour time difference, telephone the correct answers to Ma’s Los Angeles office, the indictment claims. In Los Angeles, the answers were quickly coded onto pencils and provided to graduate school applicants, it said.
Also indicted was Ma’s wife, Chen Hui Chen, who along with another woman, Linda Chu Fan, is accused of writing the test answers on pencils and driving students to test sites.
If convicted, each defendant charged faces up to five years in prison on each charge and substantial fines.
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