Oski87 said:
wifeisafurd said:
maxer said:
LMK5 said:
It will be interesting to see how it all plays out in court. The Loughlins' lawyers must have a damn good case if they were able to convince their clients to take it to trial.
I'm sure it was the opposite - the lawyers begged them to take the relatively lenient deal on offer, and the Laughlins refused.
Look art Huffman, she got essentially no jail time, not huge legal bills and better PR. My guess is this is a problem with client control.
the scope of the crime was different - cheating on one SAT test for one kid (declined on the second) for 15K or creating an entirely fraudulent application and giving half a million...
That was discussed in the media as one of the reasons why they targeted them so much as a prosecution. It seems like this was going to be the big showdown.
I wonder if this turns out like most of the other show trials recently - Bonds, etc, where the federal overreach is thwarted by the jury.
paragraph 1: Valid point with a proviso. Almost of those who didn't plead yet are from the bribe, not SAT fraud side. Some have plead and got stiffer sentences, bu not all. Robrert Flaxman paid to get his son into Univ. of San Diego and to improve his daughter's test scores (he did both). He plead early and got 1 month in prison. Huneese did both. plead later, and got 5 months. Davina and Bruce Isascson , both, prosecutors asking for low range on charges. Todd McFarlance more recently pleading for bribing two children into USC got 6 months, Stephen Semprevino, bribing child into Georgetown (4 months), Devin Sloane, bribing child into SC (4 months), Jeff Bizzack bribe to SC ( 4 months), also pleading somewhat closer to the indictments. Henriquez parents (Georgetown tennis) and Hodge parents (USC water polo) pleaded guilty recently to both The Henriquezes and , Hodge, financier who know each other, are likely to face heavier sentences because they pleaded guilty to two counts, and pleaded more recently, but are cooperating and therefore have not had preliminary sentencing. Hodge Ex- Stanford sailing coach, two separate bribes (1 day) (he pleaded early and with sympathetic circumstances), Ex USC soccer coach (low end of sentencing recommended), Ex- Texas Tennis Coach (plead guilty and is cooperating - no sentencing prelim with court yet). Why go through this list? Those who did both get a slightly higher sentence, those that just bribed got less sentence, than those who did both and those that got the biggest breaks settled early and cooperated. This is very typical of how the Feds settle cases. The other thing is the sentencing was not that much higher for those that came forward early on bribe cases than simply SAT cases.
paragraph 2: sure, that is part of litigation negotiations
paragraph 3: don't know. Would be in LA for celebs and prosecuting Bonds in SF could not have been easy. Note he was convicted of one of two types of changes (not guilty on perjury and guilty on obstruction of justice) for which he was fined and no jail time. The conviction was initially upheld by a three judge (9th Circuit) panel, but a larger panel of the court (en band) voted 10-1 to overturn the conviction technical grounds. The case against Bonds was a stretch from a legal standpoint, and probably would not have been brought if it wasn't Bonds. I'm not as convinced that is the case with Varsity Blue defendants given wire tapes, if admissible, and the jury pool differences.