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Liberal Democrats, too lazy and stupid to compete
scholastically. This is the result of the present day inferior
California school system, once the envy of the entire free
world, after 40 years of Democrat control and parasitic
socialist union infestation.

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A year ago, the feel-good Hollywood couple Felicity Huffman and
William H. Macy made a $15,000 donation to the Key Worldwide
Foundation. A bookkeeper for the charity wrote back saying that
the money would help “provide educational and self-enrichment
programs to disadvantaged youth.”

But the foundation, prosecutors said on Tuesday, was little more
than a conduit for a massive SAT-fixing and college admissions-
rigging scheme. And the youth helped by the payment was far from
disadvantaged: She was the couple’s elder daughter.

The Justice Department unsealed indictments Tuesday accusing
admissions advisers, coaches and school officials of offering
wealthy families one of two back doors into the colleges of
their choice.

[Fifty people were charged in the widespread scam to get
undeserving students into colleges.]

One method involved bribing university officials to pass off
applicants as athletic recruits even if they weren’t; the other
used brazen cheating on standardized exams. And both schemes had
Hollywood stars playing a role.

Ms. Huffman’s career in Hollywood stretches back to the 1970s.
Her performance as Bree, the transgender main character in
“Transamerica,” earned her an Oscar nomination in 2006. But much
of her work has been in television. She is best known for roles
including Lynette Scavo in “Desperate Housewives” and Dana
Whitaker in the Aaron Sorkin show “Sports Night” as well as for
several roles in the ABC show “American Crime.” Most recently,
Ms. Huffman, 56, played Special Agent Clara Dillard in Epix’s
“Get Shorty.”

In 1997, she married Mr. Macy, the same year he was nominated
for an Oscar, after he starred in “Fargo.” Mr. Macy, 68, a
veteran of many movies, currently plays Frank Gallagher, the
head of the dysfunctional family in the Showtime comedy series
“Shameless.” They have two daughters: The elder was born in
2000, and the younger two years later.

According to the authorities, William Singer, the head of a
college preparatory business and the founder of the charity, met
with Ms. Huffman and Mr. Macy in their Los Angeles home and
explained how he could help them. Mr. Singer, who has pleaded
guilty and is cooperating with investigators — he is identified
as “cooperating witness 1” in the Justice Department complaint —
said he could arrange for their daughter’s SAT proctor to
secretly correct her wrong answers and boost her score. “CW-1
has advised investigators that Huffman and her spouse agreed to
the plan,” the complaint said.

Following Mr. Singer’s instructions, Ms. Huffman had her
daughter seek permission to get extra time on the SAT, an option
available to students with learning disabilities or other needs.
Once the girl received the permission, Mr. Singer instructed Ms.
Huffman to have her daughter take the test in December 2017 with
a proctor who was in on the scheme. (He is cooperating witness
No. 2.)

At first, when it appeared that a different proctor from her
daughter’s own high school would be involved, Ms. Huffman
emailed Mr. Singer: “Ruh Ro!” They soon got the plan back on
track by using another test site where, according to the
complaint, the crooked proctor would be present.

Less than two months ago, Parade published an interview with Mr.
Macy, in which he spoke of his older daughter’s college search.
“We’re right now in the thick of college application time, which
is so stressful,” he said. “I am voting that once she gets
accepted, she maybe takes a year off.”

However stressful the process was, prosecutors believe the
cheating helped his daughter’s cause.

“Ultimately, Huffman’s daughter received a score of 1420 on the
SAT, an improvement of approximately 400 points over her PSAT,
taken without CW-2 one year earlier,” said the complaint,
referring to the Preliminary SAT.

It was unclear if their daughter has been admitted to any
colleges, or if she even knew, before Tuesday, about any
cheating on her behalf.

The complaint also includes excerpts from a conversation in
which Mr. Macy, Ms. Huffman and Mr. Singer discussed repeating
the process for the younger daughter, but only after she took
the SAT on her own to see how well she would do. If they went
through with the plan, Mr. Singer explained, the second score
could only go up so much or else they would raise suspicions.

Ultimately, Ms. Huffman and Mr. Macy decided not to proceed with
the plan for their younger daughter, the complaint said.

Ms. Huffman was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and
honest services mail fraud. But Mr. Macy, who is referred to in
the complaint as her spouse but not by name, was not charged.
Neither the complaint nor prosecutors’ statements explained why,
though it is possible that prosecutors believed they did not
have enough evidence to charge him. In the emails and recorded
telephone conversations quoted in the complaint, Mr. Macy is a
direct participant only in conversations regarding the aborted
plan, not the one that was carried to fruition and resulted in
the $15,000 payment.

A representative for the couple did not respond to a request for
comment. Ms. Huffman was arrested on Tuesday morning in Los
Angeles, according to the United States Attorney’s Office in
Boston, which is spearheading the prosecution. She was released
after posting a $250,000 bond after a court appearance Tuesday,
The Associated Press reported.

Among Ms. Huffman’s most recent projects is “When They See Us,”
a Netflix series due out this year about the wrongful
convictions in the Central Park jogger case, in which she plays
Linda Fairstein, one of the prosecutors. Netflix declined to
comment.

Another actress who was charged, Lori Loughlin, was making
arrangements to surrender. Ms. Loughlin, 54, is best known for
her role as Aunt Becky in the 1990s sitcom “Full House,” a role
she reprised recently in a reboot, “Fuller House,” which
streamed on Netflix.

Her husband, Mossimo Giannulli, also was charged. Mr. Giannulli
founded the Mossimo fashion brand in 1986. The company sells
clothing and accessories around the world, including in
Australia, Mexico, Japan and India. It had a partnership with
Target that ended in 2017.

Their daughter Olivia Jade Giannulli, a budding social media
influencer with close to two million YouTube subscribers and 1.3
million Instagram followers, posted two paid advertisements on
Instagram that highlighted her identity as a student shortly
after having been admitted to the University of Southern
California. According to the Justice Department complaint, she
had a lot of help getting in.

[Read more about Olivia Giannulli, now a college student.]

Her parents are accused of paying $500,000 to have Olivia and
her sister classified as crew recruits for U.S.C. despite never
having participated in the sport, according to prosecutors. The
complaint says $100,000 was in the form of two $50,000 bribes to
Donna Heinel, a senior associate athletic director at U.S.C.,
who then marked the girls as potential members of the crew team.
Heinel was indicted.

The couple sent the other $400,000 to the foundation — a payment
of $200,000 after each daughter received her U.S.C. admission
letter.

A representative for Ms. Loughlin declined to comment.

It was not clear whether either girl knew about any scheme to
help them, or what, if anything, U.S.C. would do with them now.

In a statement, the school said: “We are aware of the ongoing
wide-ranging criminal investigation involving universities
nationwide, including U.S.C. U.S.C. has not been accused of any
wrongdoing and will continue to cooperate fully with the
government’s investigation.”

Correction: March 12, 2019
An earlier version of this article misstated the name for a
charity cited in the indictment. The charity is the Key
Worldwide Foundation, not the Key World Foundation.

Correction: March 14, 2019
An earlier version of this article misstated how the charges
were brought against Ms. Huffman, Ms. Loughlin and Mr.
Giannulli. While some people accused in the admissions cheating
scheme were indicted by a grand jury, the parents of the
students were not; they were charged by prosecutors in a
criminal complaint.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/arts/huffman-loughlin-college-
scandal.html
 

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