A 23-year-old Ukrainian national who posed as a teen to attend a Pennsylvania high school and was charged with sexual assault over a relationship with a student also used a false identity to get into a Pennsylvania citizens police academy, according to investigators.
Artur Samarin, 23, applied and was accepted into the Swatara Township Citizens Police Academy after he used a Pennsylvania driver’s license as well as a social security card for his alias, “Asher Potts,” officials said. After he attended three classes at the academy, Harrisburg City Police informed Swatara police that he had been using a fake name. Samarin was charged with identity theft and unsworn falsification to authorities in connection to the incident.
Samarin was also arrested on charges of statutory sexual assault and corruption of minors in connection to a sexual relationship he allegedly had with a 15-year-old student in 2014.
Samarin, once again using the alias Asher Potts, enrolled in Harrisburg High School as a freshman in 2012 and was a member of the National Honor Society and the school's ROTC and Naval Sea Cadet programs, police said. He was to graduate in June.
Authorities say he came to the U.S. on a three-month work visa then got a tourist visa that expired in March 2013. He enrolled as a freshman six months later.
Police were alerted to Samarin by a tipster in December who alleged Samarin was an adult living illegally in the U.S. and was having sexual relationships with female students.
Two people helped enroll him into the high school, according to a criminal complaint obtained by Pennlive.com.
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The complaint alleges Stephanye McClure-Potts and Michael Potts helped enroll Samarin with documents that listed his birthday as Sept. 3, 1997. His actual birthday is Sept. 3, 1992.
The complaint says McClure-Potts also helped Samarin get a Pennsylvania driver's license under the name Asher Potts in 2014.
McClure-Potts and Michael Potts haven't been charged. A man who answered the phone at a listing for McClure-Potts hung up on an Associated Press reporter seeking comment.
