BY KATE MEYER, GREG B. SMITH and CORKY SIEMASZKO
DAILY NEWS WRITERS
Saturday, May 7th, 2005
A New York University student who should have majored in crime was nabbed yesterday for concocting a $43 million international bank fraud scheme, authorities said.
Hakan Yalincak sobbed in a New Haven court after a federal judge ordered him jailed until a hearing next Thursday.
"I have a graduation on Wednesday," the 21-year-old math major wailed.
Yalincak allegedly deposited fake certified checks totaling $25 million into a Greenwich, Conn., account and $18 million into a Swiss bank account.
He then allegedly tried to cash in by transferring $2.5 million from the Swiss account to the bank account in Greenwich and withdrawing $1.7 million.
But bank executives - who had caught on to his scheme - froze the account and told authorities.
Yalincak, a Turkish citizen, faces up to 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine if convicted of the bank fraud charges. The suspect's parents - and NYU - may soon be crying, too.
In a separate civil case, Omer Bulent Yalincak and his wife, Ayferafet, are being sued by two investors who claim the couple and their son conned them into putting $2.9 million into a nonexistent hedge fund.
Some of the dough was part of a huge donation to NYU that the university hailed as a "remarkable $21 million gift from the Yalincak family," the suit states.
An NYU spokesman said the university has received $1.25 million of the gift and would return any ill-gotten gains.
The Yalincaks declined to comment at their expansive home in the tony Westchester town of Pound Ridge, where a Mercedes sat in their four-car garage. Federal agents searched the property yesterday.
"He's a smart kid," said Hakan Yalincak's lawyer, Robert Chan. "He has some gift in investing and people had confidence in him."
The stunning arrest comes seven months after NYU sent out a press release announcing the Yalincaks' donation to pay for an Ottoman studies professorship and a new home for the general studies program. NYU even pledged to name the general studies center after the family.
The alleged crook enrolled at NYU through its two-year general studies program before getting accepted into its more prestigious four-year bachelor's degree program.
"It's very shocking," said NYU student Jia Liu, 21. "He should go to jail."
Former student Tracey Herman, 22, laughed and said: "Obviously, they're teaching them something at NYU."
Investors Joseph Healey and Arthur Cohen have sued the Yalincaks and an alleged accomplice, charging they ripped them off by getting them to invest in a bogus fund.
Hakan Yalincak allegedly told the investors that after the fund rose to $5 million, his parents would kick in $20 million.
In February, the investors said, they were warned by a "law agency" to pull out the $2.9 million they'd invested. They tried, but got back only $1.1 million, they said.
The investors also claim the Yalincaks blew $68,000 on a Porsche and $57,000 at Tiffany's.
Investigators allegedly found that the $20 million check deposited by Yalincak's parents bounced.
