Posted on 05/21/2019 11:05:29 AM PDT by libstripper
Plus taking it as a tax deduction
No stinker, she will be popular with filing writs.
So you think this Caplan guy, big nyc attorney thought he should have fought it? Why would he plead guilty today if he thought he had a chance? Afterall, pleading to a felony is automatic disbarrment.
You have a gift for understatement. First, Ms. Laughlin and Hubby pay a cool $500K to get their air-headed spawn into a vastly overrated school (USC). Then, when they’re indicted for their role in the fraud scheme, she shows up at the courthouse smiling, waving and signing autographs. There are also reports they rejected a plea deal, then, realizing what they had done, asked prosecutors to put it back on the table. The US attorneys just laughed and said “see you in court.”
Felicity Huffman paid less than $20,000 to get someone to take the SAT for her daughter. She agreed to a plea deal, cooperated with authorities—and is still looking at four months behind bars. Laughlin and her husband will spend years in the pen, and the “vigorous defense” will make for some interesting courtroom theatrics, but it won’t save them from prison.
So, one of the co-conspiritors is a hot shot lawyer. He’s pled guilty with lots of remorseful language. Looks like free legal advice to me.
From what I’ve heard, Laughlin’s daughters aren’t exactly Mensa material, and one was content to enroll at Arizona State. And given her lack of academic ambition, that would have been perfectly fine. But like other Hollywood parents, Laughlin (apparently) couldn’t bear the thought that her daughters would wind up at a “lesser” school and eagerly signed on to the scheme to get her kids into USC.
If I were advising “Aunt Becky,” I’d tell her to get an airtight financial plan in place and put the daughters on a strict allowance while she and the hubby are in jail. Otherwise, the “girls” will devour what’s left of their fortune while the parents are behind bars.
[So you think this Caplan guy, big nyc attorney thought he should have fought it? Why would he plead guilty today if he thought he had a chance? Afterall, pleading to a felony is automatic disbarrment.]
The guy who went after the lacrosse players at UNC, Mike Nifong, thought he could rack up brownie points with black voters for the next election by nailing a clutch of Great White Defendants. The defendants’ parents emptied their bank accounts and did home equity loans to hire the best in the biz to defend them. And that was just a county-level prosecution.
Pride Goeth Before the Fall...
“They could get them on tax evasion, since they used the payments as a tax deduction- but that is also allowed.”
Since when was funneling your bribe through a fake charity to evade taxes allowed?
I believe her husband was Trump financial donor.
The Feds wouldn’t have even brought the charges if they didn’t have a slam dunk .... the key players have turned to lessen their sentences .... less than a zero chance with a jury ... the jury will get their chance to show that inconveniencing them will be painful.
That was Duke not UNC and 2 of the 3 families were well off. Well worth the fight. They would have still been in prison. Great attorneys representing them
They were innocent. The college admission scandal parents are guilty. Recordings, email, tax deductions etc.
[That was Duke not UNC and 2 of the 3 families were well off. Well worth the fight. They would have still been in prison. Great attorneys representing them
They were innocent. The college admission scandal parents are guilty. Recordings, email, tax deductions etc.]
Guilty of what? Rape is unquestionably a crime and was (1) a capital offense for most of human history, and (2) considered a justifiable basis for multi-generational blood feuds up to, and including, all-out war. Honest services theft is a federal charge of relatively new vintage and was criticized as an overreach by the late great Scalia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honest_services_fraud
[The statute grants jurisdiction to the federal government to prosecute local, state and federal officials. It is frequently used to fight public corruption because it is easier to prove than bribery or extortion.[1][22][23] The term “honest services” is broad and open to jury interpretation, according to several legal experts.[22] Prosecutions under the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) frequently use violations of the honest services statute,[1] as mail and wire fraud are predicate acts of racketeering; therefore, two mailings or wire transmissions in the execution of honest services fraud can form “a pattern of racketeering activity.”[6]
Prosecutions for honest services fraud that do not involve public corruption generally involve corporate crime, although the line between torts and crimes in such cases is considered murky and unclear.[6]
The law is reportedly a favorite of federal prosecutors because the language of statute is vague enough to be applied to corrupt political officials’ unethical or criminal activities when they do not fall into a specific category, such as bribery or extortion.[22] For similar reasons, defense attorneys dislike the law, viewing it as a poorly defined law that can be used by prosecutors to convert any kind of unethical behavior into a federal crime.[22]
Nevertheless, prosecutors must still prove all the elements of mail fraud or wire fraud in a case regarding a scheme to defraud of honest services.[22]
The late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia criticized the statute, stating that the clause was so poorly defined that it could be the basis for prosecuting “a mayor for using the prestige of his office to get a table at a restaurant without a reservation.”[24]
In The Perfect Villain: John McCain and the Demonization of Lobbyist Jack Abramoff, investigative journalist Gary S. Chafetz argued that honest-services fraud is so vague as to be unconstitutional, and that prosecutors abused it as a tool to increase their conviction rates.[25] Bennett L. Gershmann, a professor at Pace University Law School, similarly has contended that the law “is not only subject to abuse...but has been abused.”[26] The case of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman is often cited as an example of possible prosecutorial misconduct and abuse of the honest services law.[26]
Many interest groups oppose the usage of the honest services law, including the conservative United States Chamber of Commerce and Washington Legal Foundation, as well as the more liberal National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.[26] One notable proponent of the law is the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.[26][27][28] ]
I read an account of the Duke case where the parents claimed to have HELOC’ed their homes to pay for the defense. They may or may not have exaggerated their circumstances, but it was a major financial undertaking. And that was a pretty cut-and-dried rape case where the law was established. Here, everything is loosey-goosey and just crying out for a defense with with real money backing it to take it apart.
[Since when was funneling your bribe through a fake charity to evade taxes allowed?]
The point being that there are a lot of loopholes re charities that can’t be closed because they would cause problems for real charities. So you take the good with the bad.
“As long as the law considers it a real charity, it’s allowed.”
Obviously not, if people are getting prosecuted for it. Just because the charity is “legal” doesn’t mean that it can’t be misused in criminal activity. Fraud is still fraud, even if the charity’s paper work is in order.
“The Clinton Global Initiative is one such charity. Are the Clintons getting prosecuted for it?”
They certainly should be.
I suppose I’m just not the type of person that say “well one person got any with it, guess we let everyone get away with it”.
[Obviously not, if people are getting prosecuted for it. Just because the charity is “legal” doesn’t mean that it can’t be misused in criminal activity. Fraud is still fraud, even if the charity’s paper work is in order.]
The way prosecutors work, they throw everything they can at the wall and hope that something sticks. It’s called overcharging. It costs them nothing. Doesn’t mean any of the charges will stick. The case will take time to wend its way through the courts. We’ll see how it plays out.
SAT Practice Tests
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat/practice/full-length-practice-tests
SAT Practice Test (2019 Version)
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat/practice/full-length-practice-tests
They just ask for a bank account number : )
Hopefully the heads of the schools will also go to jail as they had to know this has been going on forever.
He knew they had him by the short hairs, so he cut the bet deal he could and ran.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.