BOSTON (AP) — The mastermind of the nationwide college admissions bribery scandal is about to be sentenced on Wednesday after serving to authorities safe the convictions of a slew of rich dad and mom concerned in his scheme to rig the choice course of at top-tier colleges.
Federal prosecutors are asking for six years behind bars for Rick Singer, who for greater than a decade helped deep-pocketed dad and mom get their typically undeserving youngsters get into a few of the nation’s most selective colleges with bogus take a look at scores and athletic credentials.
The scandal embarrassed elite universities throughout the nation, put a highlight on the secretive admissions system already seen as rigged in favor of the wealthy and laid naked the measures some dad and mom will take to get their youngsters into the varsity of their selection.
Singer, 62, started secretly cooperating with investigators and labored with the FBI to document a whole bunch of telephone calls and conferences earlier than the arrest of dozens of fogeys and athletic coaches in March 2019. Greater than 50 individuals — together with fashionable TV actresses and outstanding businessmen — have been in the end convicted within the case authorities dubbed Operation Varsity Blues.
Within the practically 4 years because the scandal exploded into newspaper headlines, Singer remained out of jail and stored largely silent publicly. He was by no means referred to as as a witness by prosecutors within the circumstances that went to trial, however will get an opportunity to handle the courtroom earlier than the choose fingers down his sentence in Boston federal courtroom.
In a letter to the choose, Singer blamed his actions on his “profitable in any respect prices” perspective, which he stated was brought on partially by suppressed childhood trauma. His lawyer is requesting three years of probation, or if the choose deems jail time needed, six months behind bars.
“By ignoring what was morally, ethically, and legally proper in favor of profitable what I perceived was the faculty admissions ‘recreation,’ I’ve misplaced all the things,” Singer wrote.
Singer pleaded responsible in 2019 — on the identical day the huge case grew to become public — to prices together with racketeering conspiracy and cash laundering conspiracy. Dozens of others in the end pleaded responsible to prices, whereas two dad and mom have been convicted at trial.
Authorities blew the lid off the scandal after an executive under investigation for an unrelated securities fraud scheme advised investigators {that a} Yale soccer coach had provided to assist his daughter get into the varsity in change for money. The Yale coach led authorities to Singer, whose cooperation unraveled the sprawling scheme.
For years, Singer paid off entrance examination directors or proctors to inflate college students’ take a look at scores and bribed athletic coaches to designate candidates as recruits for sports activities they often didn’t even play, in search of to spice up their probabilities of entering into the varsity. Singer took in additional than $25 million from his purchasers, paid bribes totaling greater than $7 million, and used greater than $15 million of his purchasers’ cash for his personal profit, in accordance with prosecutors.
“He was the architect and mastermind of a prison enterprise that massively corrupted the integrity of the faculty admissions course of – which already favors these with wealth and privilege – to a level by no means earlier than seen on this nation,” prosecutors wrote in courtroom paperwork.
If the choose agrees with prosecutors, it will be by far the longest sentence handed down within the case. Thus far, the hardest punishment has gone to former Georgetown College tennis coach Gordon Ernst, who got 2 1/2 years in prison for pocketing more than $3 million in bribes.
One father or mother, who wasn’t accused of working with Singer, was acquitted on all counts stemming from accusations that he bribed Ernst to get his daughter into the varsity. And a judge ordered a new trial for former University of Southern California water polo Jovan Vavic, who was convicted of accepting bribes.
