A 28-year-old woman and her mother were arrested on Tuesday, June 12, after the 28-year-old posed as a 17-year-old student and enrolled at Hahnville High School in Boutte, Louisiana.
Martha Jessenia Gutierrez-Serrano, 28, and her mother, Marta Elizeth Serrano-Alvarado, 46, both of Boutte, were charged with "injuring public records," according to the Associated Press.
In Louisiana, the charge of "injuring public records" is defined as "the intentional removal, mutilation, destruction, alteration, falsification, or concealment of any record, document, or other thing, filed or deposited, by authority of law, in any public office or with any public officer," according to Louisiana.gov.
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The St. Charles Parish Sheriff's Office was notified on Monday that Gutierrez-Serrano was suspected of being an adult who was posing as a teen.
"School Administration received a tip that a female student, who was on record as being 17 years old, was in fact an adult possibly in her mid 20s. School Administration began an internal investigation and later notified the Sheriff’s Office of their findings," according to a Wednesday news release from the sheriff's office that was shared on its Facebook page.
During this investigation, it was discovered that Serrano-Alvarado had enrolled her daughter in school using a forged passport and birth certificate from Honduras, the AP also said.
Gutierrez-Serrano was enrolled at the school in June 2022 and had attended for the entirety of the 2022-2023 school year, said the sheriff's office.
"Gutierrez-Serrano was not involved in any extracurricular activities, and we are not aware of any disciplinary issues while attending school," said the news release.
"She utilized school transportation to and from school. There is no current evidence of any other criminal activity or inappropriate conduct by either Serrano-Alvarado or Gutierrez-Serrano."
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Gutierrez-Serrano could "very easily be taken for a young teenager, without a doubt," St. Charles Parish Sheriff Greg Champagne said at a news conference on Wednesday.
She enrolled in the school to learn English, Champagne also noted.
"She wanted to learn English. She wanted to become proficient in the English language," he said.
"There was no nefarious reason behind this," Champagne added.
There are a multitude of legal avenues that Gutierrez-Serrano could have taken to learn English, including GED and ESL programs, he also said.
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"Certainly that is a much better option than falsifying records," he continued.
The charge of first degree injuring public records carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison or a fine of $5,000.
Hahnville High School has roughly 1,400 students in grades 9-12, says its website.
Boutte is southwest of New Orleans.
Gutierrez-Serrano is not the only person in recent months to have impersonated a teenager in a high school.
In January, a junior varsity basketball coach in Portsmouth, Virginia, was fired after she attempted to impersonate a 13-year-old player on her team and play in a game, Fox News Digital reported.
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Also in January, a 29-year-old woman with a college degree was arrested after she posed as a 15-year-old student and enrolled at New Brunswick High School in New Jersey.
Unlike Gutierrez-Serrano, who attended school for an entire academic year before being caught, the New Jersey woman lasted just four days during her second attempt at high school before being discovered.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
