A brilliant graduate of Great Neck North HS who is now a senior at Tulane University has been identified as a second fraudulent test taker in Long Island’s mushrooming SAT-cheating scandal, sources told The Post.
Joshua Chefec, 20, son of prominent Garden City lawyer David Chefec, is expected to be one of up to 13 suspects to surrender early today to Nassau County authorities, the sources said.
Joshua Chefec will be charged with at least one count of felony scheme to defraud, sources said.
The latest round of arrests in the probe will include up to four people accused of taking the tests fraudulently and nine people accused of paying them to do so, the sources said.
According to prosecutors, students paid test takers to pose as them on test day in order to boost their scores and better their chances of getting into a top college.
Chefec is a senior majoring in business at Tulane, where two of the other students implicated in the scheme had been accepted using SAT scores from tests taken by former Great Neck student Sam Eshaghoff.
Eshaghoff was busted with six other alleged cheaters in September, when the Nassau County district attorney first exposed the scandal.
The accused phony test takers — who allegedly used fake IDs and took the SATs at remote locations where they would not be recognized — face felony charges, sources said.
Those who allegedly paid, forking over up to $3,500 depending on the final SAT or ACT score, will be treated as youthful offenders and hit with misdemeanors, sources said.
In an interview 10 days ago, David Chefec denied that his son was a test taker.
“Josh is a very smart kid. I really doubt he would be involved in anything like that. He works hard, and he’s earned everything he’s gotten,” he said.
He did not accept a call to his office yesterday, and no one answered the door at the family’s home.
Classmates described Chefec, a 2009 grad, as a smart student who studied hard but also liked to party.
Tulane spokesman Mike Strecker said that the school was unaware of any SAT misdeeds but that it would look into his status if wrongdoing comes to light.
Attorney Kevin Keating confirmed yesterday that two people he’s representing will surrender today and plead not guilty to paying test takers.
They include students from the public Roslyn and Great Neck South high schools and St. Mary’s, a Catholic high school in Manhasset, sources said.