Asher Potts was finishing a stellar high school run.
He was in the National Honor Society and was a member of his school’s ROTC and had, at least at one point, achieved a 4.16 grade-point average, Pennsylvania state
Rep. Patty Kim once noted in a tweet.
“He was the perfect role model, someone you would want your son to look up to,” Marcel McCaskill, who knew Potts through a math and science program,
told the Associated Press.
Potts was on track to graduate from Harrisburg’s John Harris High School this spring. But it all came crashing down this week.
Eighteen-year-old Asher Potts, it turns out, was actually 23-year-old Artur Samarin, a Ukrainian national. He was arrested on Tuesday on charges of identity theft, tampering with public records and theft by unlawful taking.
Harrisburg Bureau of Police Capt. Gabriel Olivera said authorities would confirm little beyond the most basic facts of Samarin’s case — at least until an official inquiry is finished, which may happen as soon as Friday.
“We’re still finishing up some of the things regarding our investigation,” Olivera said Thursday.
A doctor, a politician, an ROTC overachiever. Lately, it seems like a number of teenagers are not who they claim to be. (Gillian Brockell/The Washington Post)
Samarin overstayed his visa and then obtained a Social Security card and other U.S. documents using his false identity, according to police. He enrolled in high school in the fall of 2012.
When he was arrested on Tuesday, Samarin was carrying a driver’s license with Potts’s name.
Police first received a tip about Samarin about two months ago, Sgt. Terry Wealand told the Associated Press. He lived with friends and police are investigating whether he had help in faking his identity.
“I would think there would have to be someone who knew,” Wealand said. “And if there is, they are going to pay, too.”
Asher Potts was listed as a panelist at a January event on guns, drugs and violence, hosted by the school in collaboration with the city’s mayor and chief of police.
He was also featured prominently in a 2014 Lebanon Daily News story about food bank volunteers.
In it, Potts — identified as a 17-year-old John Harris High student — explained how he got involved:
“My parents and I were at Walmart, and when we were in the check-out line, the lady in front of us couldn’t pay for her food and had to put it back,” Potts said.
Curious, Potts asked his parents why she had to put back the items, and they told him she couldn’t afford the food. Potts then asked his parents if they could afford food and they told him “yes.”
“That’s when a lightbulb went on and I knew I needed to help the less fortunate,” he said.
McCaskill told the AP that he was shocked to hear that “Asher Potts,” whom he’d met during a seven-week math and science program, was actually Artur Samarin.
“It’s totally mind-blowing to me,” said McCaskill, a student in his first year at Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia. “Honestly, he was a very respectable guy. He was the perfect role model, someone you would want your son to look up to.”
Niraj Chokshi is a general assignment reporter for The Washington Post.
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