William Rick Singer, the mastermind of a nationwide college admissions fraud scheme, was sentenced to three and a half years in prison and supervised release Wednesday afternoon in Boston.
Singer, 62, pleaded guilty in March 2019 to charges including racketeering conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy in connection with the scandal, dubbed Operation Varsity Blues. She cooperated with the government investigation and used a wire for the FBI.
In addition to the 42 months served in prison, Singer will have three years of supervised release.
The operation involved bribery, cheating on entrance exams and unqualified applicants using false claims to get into schools as elite recruited athletes.
Prosecutors had requested a six-year sentence, while defense attorneys requested three years of probation or a maximum of six months behind bars.
Singer’s sentence is the longest handed down in the case so far, followed by former Georgetown University tennis coach Gordon Ernst, who received two and a half years in prison for pocketing more than $3 million in bribes.
So far, more than 50 people, including parents and coaches, have been convicted in the case. The cheating scheme ensnared Hollywood with actors Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman charged in the case.
Singer allegedly obtained more than $25 million from his clients, paid bribes totaling more than $7 million and used more than $15 million of his clients’ money for his own gain, prosecutors said.
In a letter filed Dec. 29 with his defense sentencing memorandum, Singer said he now lives in a trailer park and is unable to get a job, despite more than 1,000 attempts, because of his role in Operation Varsity. Blues.
“For most of my life, if not all, I have thrived on winning at all costs,” he wrote. “My moral compass was broken, and more and more over time, choosing good over evil became less important than doing whatever it took to be recognized as the ‘best.’”
By being caught, he has been given “the opportunity for insight, atonement and redemption,” he wrote.
