ATHENS, Greece — A prosecutor on Greece’s Supreme Court is set to intervene in a case of educational fraud that has roiled the country and united political parties, labor unions and rights groups: A 53-year-old cleaner is serving 10 years in prison for falsifying her primary school diploma to get a public sector job. 
 
 An initial court ruling two years ago handed the woman a 15-year prison term for defrauding the public; the sentence was reduced this month, and she has been in Thiva prison in central Greece ever since. 
 
 An online petition for her release had drawn more than 20,000 signatures by Friday afternoon. 
 
 “This decision is not simply inhumane,” the Hellenic League for Human Rights said of the decision to sentence her to jail for 10 years. “It is another very indicative sign of permanent ailments in the criminal justice system.” 
 
 The unidentified cleaner had worked at a state kindergarten in Volos, in central Greece, for 18 years, until a review in 2014 revealed that she had doctored a certificate to show she had completed six years of primary education (roughly elementary level) instead of only five. Six years is the required term for primary school students to complete their education. 

 A cleaning lady in Greece has been given a 10-year jail term — for lying about her primary school education. 
 
 The woman, 53, had worked for a state-funded nursery for 15 years before a review in 2014 revealed she had forged an education certificate. 
 
 She completed five years of primary education but changed documents to make it look like she had done six. 
 
 The minimum requirement for state-employed cleaners is to complete the first six years of elementary education. 
 
 The case has caused an uproar in Greece for being unduly strict. 
 
 The Hellenic Association for Human Rights said the decision was “inhuman” and the judge “excessively rigid”. 
 
 When the woman was growing up it would not have been uncommon for poverty to force some Greek children to quit school early so they could earn some money. 
 
 "I am ashamed, but I did it for my children,” she told a local newspaper. “I didn't want them to be raised in an orphanage like me.” 
 
 A prosecutor at Greece’s supreme court will now examine the original decision to see if the case should be retried. 
 
 The woman was jailed after her fraud conviction by a court in Larissa in central Greece.
– A woman in Greece has roused her nation—and now the world—after getting a 10-year sentence for altering her elementary-school record, the New York Times reports. "This decision is not simply inhumane," says the Hellenic League for Human Rights. "It is another very indicative sign of permanent ailments in the criminal justice system." Labor unions, rights groups, and political parties have raised such a ruckus over her punishment that politicians are speaking up and the nation's Supreme Court plans to take a look. But things seemed grim when the cleaner, who worked for 18 years at a state kindergarten in central Greece, was found in 2014 to have altered her school record. She claimed to have finished six years in elementary school instead of five; six is needed to finish that level of schooling. She initially got 15 years for defrauding the public, but that was eased this month by five years. "I am ashamed, but I did it for my children," she says, per Euronews. "I didn't want them to be raised in an orphanage like me." The woman, who apparently took the job to support her two children and sick husband, says she has nine siblings and was raised in an orphanage. Now her lawyer has appealed to Greece's high court, where a prosecutor plans to probe "dozens" of such cases involving fake documents and prison sentences. With a petition in her name drawing nearly 40,000 signatures as of this writing, even Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras' Syriza party is speaking up. Her jail sentence "offends the sense of common justice and shakes citizens’ trust in the judiciary," the party says. (In another fraud case, parents are accused of stealing children's identities.)