A University of Wisconsin student and his brother arrested for manufacturing fake IDs for students last spring have been sentenced to thousand-dollar fines.
Single counts of manufacturing fake IDs could have earned the brothers up to three years in jail and fines up to $10,000, but both pled guilty and faced significantly lighter sentences.
UW student Bao Hoang Quoc Nguyen, who told police he only made fake IDs when his brother had too many clients or too much homework, received a $1,325 fine on Aug. 13.
The UW student’s 22-year-old brother Tuan Hoang Quoc Nguyen pleaded no-contest Tuesday, receiving a two-year probation sentence with community service and a $1,345 fine.
When the men were arrested last March, students called Tuan the largest manufacturer of fake IDs on campus. According to a UW Police report, Tuan said he started producing fake IDs in his Park Street apartment during last school year, earning $12,000 in 2003.
Tuan created Minnesota IDs using simple Photoshop software and digital cameras, sticking holograms onto the IDs, which were printed on MD5000 quality paper. Tuan used original photographs of the buyers and only changed the student’s city, state and date of birth.
According to the police report, Tuan said he charged $120 per ID and had more than 100 people buy from in him 2003. UW police discovered the fake ID ring March 7, when officers stopped two UW students buying alcohol from Vineyard Liquor and confiscated their IDs.
According the police report, the fake Minnesota IDs “looked very authentic.” The two students told police they obtained the IDs from Tuan.
The two students also led police to UW student Robert Zemple, a “middle-man” that brought money and buyers to Tuan. Police arrested Zemple, naming him as an accomplice to the crime.
Zemple pled guilty to the charges, and his final sentence has not yet been publicly recorded.
UW students who learned of Zemple’s charges in March baked him cookies and brought them to him to show their support.
Another UW student said in March that she had known Tuan for a year and wished the incident had never happened. The student wished to remain anonymous so she could continue using her fake ID.
“He’s a really good guy, he just took the wrong profession,” she said. “He is a funny, down-to-earth kind of guy.”
The student also said the IDs worked well on campus. However, she said the IDs did not work as well in Minnesota because bouncers were more familiar with the state’s IDs, noticing the ID print had been faked and that the material of the IDs was not legitimate.
“They were the biggest one on campus,” she said. “Anyone I talked to said they had gotten their IDs from them.”
