College Admissions Scandal Mastermind Rick Singer Sentenced To 3.5 Years In Prison

Topline

Rick Singer—the mastermind behind the so-called Varsity Blues college admissions cheating scandal—was sentenced in federal court on Wednesday to 42 months in prison, the latest jail sentence in a wide-ranging probe that has ensnared actors and other wealthy individuals.

Key Facts

Judge Rya Zobel also ordered Singer to pay $10 million in restitution to the IRS.

Singer, a former college counselor behind the nonprofit Key World Foundation and The Edge College & Career Network, had pleaded guilty in 2019 to racketeering and money laundering conspiracy, as well as obstruction of justice for tipping clients about the FBI’s investigation into the scheme, nicknamed Operation Varsity Blues.

Federal prosecutors had asked for six years in prison, three years of supervised release and $10.6 million in restitution to the IRS and the forfeiture of $8.7 million, with prosecutor Stephen Frank reportedly calling Singer the “face of this fraud.”

Singer’s attorneys, Candice Fields and A. Neil Hartzell, asked for three years of probation and a maximum of six months behind bars if the judge ruled prison time was necessary, due to his cooperation with federal agents during the investigation.

Key Background

Singer, 62, is one of 57 people charged following the Operation Varsity Blues probe, including 33 parents, 13 coaches, college test administrators and other associates of Singer. The most prominent defendants included actors Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin, who faced jail time for conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services fraud after paying Singer to falsify their children’s records. Loughlin’s husband Mossimo Giannulli allegedly paid $500,000 in bribes to get his two daughters into the University of Southern California, leading to a five-month sentence. When asked about the scheme by a federal judge in 2019, Singer admitted to bribing SAT and ACT college admission test administrators, paying college coaches to falsely claim students had been recruited to college sports programs and falsifying students’ ethnicities to take advantage of affirmative action programs designed to diversify university admissions. Singer cooperated with the FBI during its investigation by recording calls with clients and wearing a wire during meetings. In 2019, he told a federal judge in Boston he was “absolutely responsible” for the scheme and that he knew what he was doing was illegal.

Tangent

Huffman, who starred in Desperate Housewives and Frasier, spent 11 days in prison after being sentenced in September 2019 to two weeks in prison, 250 hours of community service and ordered to pay a $30,000 fine for paying $15,000 to falsify her daughter’s SAT scores, admitting there were “no excuses or justifications for my actions.” Loughlin, who starred in Full House, served a two-month prison sentence for her role in the scheme, having paid Singer $500,000 to falsify her daughters’ admissions to USC as crew team recruits, despite not having been on a crew team before.

Big Number

$25 million. That’s how much Singer took from his clients to bribe coaches and college administrators, including at Yale, USC, Georgetown, UCLA, Wake Forest, Stanford, the University of Texas and the University of San Diego, according to federal prosecutors.

Further Reading

Rick Singer, Mastermind of College-Admissions Cheating Scandal, Faces Sentencing (Wall Street Journal)

30 Fast Facts About The College Admissions Scandal (Forbes)

‘Varsity Blues’ mastermind Rick Singer faces sentencing in college admissions scandal (CBS News)