Wanted: Lookalike!
HE, In The News Saturday, February 2nd, 2008
We think this has to be made into some kind of film. Why-oh-why an experienced banker would then decide to go back to college to finish someone else’s exams, the Great Man himself only knows!!!
City banker, 34, sat exams for student, 22
“A City investment banker who held senior positions at Bank of America and Credit Suisse may face jail after posing as a university undergraduate in order to help a student cheat his way through his final-year economics exams.
Jerome Drean, 34, the former head of European equity derivatives trading at Credit Suisse, pretended to be Elnar Askerov, a 22-year-old Azerbaijani economics student at the University of York. Although there was no physical resemblance, Drean is believed to have sat eight exams over a period of 18 months, using a false identity card to pose as Askerov.
The two men pleaded guilty at York crown court yesterday to conspiring to defraud the University of York.
The fraud was discovered on the same day that a second imposter was found to be sitting an exam for another student on the same course. Qui Shi Zhang, 23, persuaded another Chinese undergraduate, Xin Zhang, 24, to sit the business finance paper on his behalf. Each man was sentenced to 100 hours of community service after pleading guilty to fraud charges.
But Drean and Askerov were told they may face much stiffer punishments when they are sentenced next month. Judge Stephen Ashurst said: “I want you to both understand, and you are clearly intelligent men, that all sentencing options including custody will be considered,” he said.
Alexander Cameron QC, defending, said the men had not realised what they had done was a criminal offence.
York University is now planning to introduce biometric technology to prevent any repetition of the scam.”