Poppy Bilderbeck
Police have spoken out following the arrest of a 28-year-old woman who allegedly faked being 17 to get into high school.
While admittedly, education is a massive privilege and not all doom and gloom, I personally wouldn't return to high school specifically even if offered a million pounds - the endless amount of lessons, stressful exams and the bullying - it's a firm no from me.
So why a woman would reportedly illegally enroll, pretending to be a lot younger to go through all the experiences of high school, remains fairly baffling to me.
Perhaps she was trying to live out her wildest 21 Jump Street dreams?
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Hahnville High School in Boutte, Los Angeles, received reports of a woman above the age of 18 attending it's 2022-2023 year and so began an internal investigation.
A woman was accused of pretending to be a 17-year-old but actually being in her twenties.
After the school's administration handed over its findings to authorities on Monday, 29 May, police arrested a 28-year-old woman named Martha Jessenia Gutierrez-Serrano as well as her mother, 46-year-old Marta Elizeth Serrano-Alvarado.
St Charles Parish Sheriff's Office took to Facebook to reveal details of the arrest.
The post reads: "Through investigation [obtaining search warrants for the home of Gutierrez-Serrano and Serrano-Alvarado], Detectives learned Gutierrez-Serrano’s mother, Serrano-Alvarado had enrolled her in school using a fraudulent passport and birth certificate.
"Detectives applied for and were granted arrest warrants for Marta Elizeth Serrano-Alvarado and Martha Jessenia Gutierrez-Serrano.
"This investigation was conducted with the full cooperation of the St. Charles Parish Public School System."
Serrano-Alvarado and Gutierrez-Serrano have both since been charged with one count each of LA RS 14:132 - Injuring Public Records, as per the police statement.
The mother and daughter could face up to five years in prison , on top of fines - if found guilty.
And this isn't the first time something like this has happened either, with 29-year-old Hyejeong Shin enrolling herself at New Brunswick high school in New Jersey using a fake birth certificate and caught out after attending four days of lessons.
Shin has since pleaded not guilty to the charges, and similarly faces five years in prison.
It's not certain how many days Gutierrez-Serrano was able to attend the school before her true age was discovered.
UNILAD has contacted Hahnville High School for comment.
Anyone with any information relating to this investigation is asked to contact Sergeant Allan Tabora with the St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Office Special Investigations Division at (985) 783-6807, (985) 783-1159, or email [email protected].