White woman jailed after claiming her son was Black on college application

jail cell
Photo credit: Ana Aguirre Perez / Shutterstock.com

A White woman from Menlo Park, California will spend time in jail for claiming that her son was Black on a college application. Marjorie Klapper, 51, worked with Rick Singer who orchestrated the scam.

In 2017, Klapper paid $15,000 to Singer’s non-profit and she wrote it off on her taxes as a charitable expense, according to the Los Angeles Times. However, the payment was used as a way to secure an ACT exam administered by one of Singer’s proctors.


Klapper’s son received a 30 out of a possible 36 on the ACT.  He was also falsely listed as African American, Latino, and the first in his family to attend college on his college applications in the hopes it would increase his chances of being admitted.

“Klapper briefly hesitated to describe her son as a first-generation college student, not because she believed it was wrong, but because she wanted to be sure the advantage he would gain by pretending to be the first in his family to attend college would carry more weight than his legacy status at his father’s alma mater,” assistant U.S. attorney Justin O’Connell said during the trial.


Klapper faced up to 20 years in prison for the crime, but she was only sentenced to three weeks.

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