Like many other Americans, Wendy Williams is outraged by the latest college admissions scandal involving a number of wealthy parents. Among those mentioned, celebrities Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman have also been accused of paying money under the table to help their children’s chances of being admitted to some of the most prestigious collegiate institutes in the United States.

Now, Wendy Williams is weighing in on the situation. According to Hollywood Life, the massive scandal was a topic of discussion during Hot Topics on The Wendy Williams Show. The famed talk show host made her sentiments quite clear. She believes the wealthy elites who took advantage of their positions and resources should be held accountable for their actions.

“The rest of us struggle while the rich continue to take advantage of us,” Wendy said as she began her show. “Lock em’ all up! … It’s disgusting, horrible.”

Wendy Williams went on to criticize Fuller House star Lori Loughlin and her husband, Mossimo Giannulli. While Wendy admitted she sees Felicity Huffman as “the lesser of the two evils,” she believes the scandal should negatively impact Lori Loughlin’s career.

“Lori Loughlin, she and her husband are the worst of the lot so far. ‘Full House’, what’s going to happen to Fuller House’? Do you cancel the show because she’s a liar? I wouldn’t mind! I mean, this is terrible… Felicity Huffman is the lesser of the two evils, so they say… Who’s going to be friends with these liars now? Who’s going to be friends with their kids? … For you kids who were cheating and lying, get ready.”

The latest news follows a string of reports about Lori Loughlin, Felicity Huffman, and the many others who have been accused of pulling strings to ensure their children’s acceptance into some of the country’s most prestigious colleges and universities.

According to ABC News, Lori Loughlin has been taken into custody in connection with the highly publicized $25 million college admissions scam. She, Felicity Huffman, and 48 others are at the center of the massive investigation. Like Wendy Williams, many other celebrities have spoken out to voice their concerns about the scandal. A total of 33 parents are reportedly facing charges of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

Andrew Lelling, U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts, shared details about the parents involved and how they worked to ensure their children would be admitted to Yale, Stanford, Georgetown and the University of Southern California, according to the publication.

“The parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege,” Lelling said. “They include, for example, the CEOs of private and public companies, successful securities and real estate investors, two well-known actresses, a famous fashion designer and the co-chairman of a global law firm.”</s>BOSTON — A fast-moving college admissions scandal moved from bombshell indictments to guilty pleas in a matter of hours, yet the full fallout from the federal case against the rich and famous could take months or more to unfold.

Big names such as actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin headline the list of some 50 people charged in documents released Tuesday that describe a scheme to cheat the admissions process at eight sought-after schools. The parents bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into selective schools, authorities said.

At the center of the scheme was admissions consultant William "Rick" Singer, founder of the Edge College & Career Network of Newport Beach, California, authorities said. Singer pleaded guilty and his lawyer, Donald Heller, said his client intends to cooperate fully with prosecutors and is "remorseful and contrite and wants to move on with his life."

RELATED: College bribery allegations stunning to those in the industry

Prosecutors said that parents paid Singer big money from 2011 up until just last month to bribe coaches and administrators to falsely make their children look like star athletes to boost their chances of getting accepted. The consultant also hired ringers to take college entrance exams for students, and paid off insiders at testing centers to correct students' answers.

Some parents spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and some as much as $6.5 million to guarantee their children's admission, officials said.

"These parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege," U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said.

At least nine athletic coaches and 33 parents were charged. Dozens, including Huffman, the Emmy-winning star of ABC's "Desperate Housewives," were arrested by midday Tuesday. Huffman posted a $250,000 bond after an appearance in federal court in Los Angeles. Her husband, actor William H. Macy, has not been charged, though an FBI agent stated in an affidavit that he was in the room when Huffman first heard the pitch from a scam insider.

It was unclear when the "Full House" star Loughlin would turn herself in. Loughlin's husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, was released in Los Angeles after posting a $1 million bond.

USA TODAY reported Loughlin was due in court Wednesday. NBC News reported Loughlin had been out of the country for work.

FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2019 file photo, actress Lori Loughlin poses at the 2019 "An Unforgettable Evening" in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

The coaches worked at schools such as Yale, Stanford, Georgetown, Wake Forest, the University of Texas, the University of Southern California and the University of California at Los Angeles.

Stanford's sailing coach John Vandemoer pleaded guilty Tuesday in Boston. A former Yale soccer coach pleaded guilty before the documents went public and helped build the case against others.

No students were charged, with authorities saying that in many cases the teenagers were unaware of what was going on. Several of the colleges involved made no mention of taking any action against the students.

Several defendants, including Huffman, were charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

"For every student admitted through fraud, an honest and genuinely talented student was rejected," Lelling said.

Lelling said the investigation is continuing and authorities believe other parents were involved. The IRS is also investigating, since some parents allegedly disguised the bribes as charitable donations.

The colleges themselves are not targets, the prosecutor said. A number of the institutions moved quickly to fire or suspend the coaches and distance their name from the scandal, portraying themselves as victims. Stanford fired the sailing coach, and USC dropped its water polo coach and an athletic administrator. UCLA suspended its soccer coach, and Wake Forest did the same with its volleyball coach.</s>Fifty people were charged Tuesday in a scheme in which wealthy parents allegedly bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into some of the nation's most elite universities.

According to federal prosecutors, here is how the college admissions bribery scheme worked:

Parents of prospective students conspired with a college entrance consultant to beat the system and ensure their students were admitted or had a better chance to be admitted to certain colleges or universities, including Yale, Stanford, Texas, UCLA, USC, Wake Forest and others.

Prosecutors allege several methods were used including:

— Bribing those administering college entrance exams to provide answers, change answers or allow someone other than the student to take the exam and centers "controlled" by the consultant. Often students were told to declare a disability that would require they be given extra time, often a second day, to complete the exams.

— Bribing college coaches or athletic administrators to make it appear the students were athletes being recruited to the school, including creating fake athletic credentials.

— Having someone take classes in the place of a student and using those grades on applications.

— Between 2011-2018 prosecutors allege parents paid the consultant $25 million to bribe coaches and college administrators to designate their children as student athletes or member of other groups given favored admission status. Prosecutors say payments were often disguised as charitable donations that were then funneled to the coaches and administrators.

— Prosecutors say the consultant represented to parents that the scheme had worked successfully more than 800 times.

— The consultant, William "Rick" Singer of Newport Beach, California pleaded guilty in Boston federal court on Tuesday to charges including racketeering conspiracy and obstruction of justice .

William 'Rick' Singer founder of the Edge College & Career Network, departs federal court in Boston on Tuesday, March 12, 2019, after he pleaded guilty to charges in a nationwide college admissions bribery scandal.

— Nine coaches are accused, including former Yale women's soccer coach Rudy Meredith; UCLA soccer coach Jorge Salcedo, Wake Forest volleyball coach Bill Ferguson and Stanford sailing coach John Vandemoer.

John Vandemoer, former head sailing coach at Stanford, arrives at federal court in Boston on Tuesday, March 12, 2019, where he plead guilty to charges in a nationwide college admissions bribery scandal.

— More than 30 parents are accused of paying bribes, including well-known actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin and her husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli.

This combination photo shows actress Lori Loughlin at the Women's Cancer Research Fund's An Unforgettable Evening event in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Feb. 27, 2018, left, and actress Felicity Huffman at the 70th Primetime Emmy Awards in Los Angeles on Sept. 17, 2018. Loughlin and Huffman are among at least 40 people indicted in a sweeping college admissions bribery scandal. Both were charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud in indictments unsealed Tuesday in federal court in Boston. (AP Photo)

— No students were charged, prosecutors said they were often unaware of the measures being taken on their behalf.</s>By now, we should’ve all learned that sitcom and T.V. legends aren’t off limits when it comes to a scandalous past.

This proved to be true this week when well-known T.V. actors were charged for trying to finesse their kids into college.

According to USA Today, Lori Loughlin is one person caught up in what’s being called the nation’s largest-ever college admissions bribery case prosecuted by the Justice Department.

Loughlin famously played Aunt Becky in the forever-syndicated 1990s sitcom Full House. She was the love interest of the suave Uncle Jesse (played by John Stamos), and eventually they got married and had two adorable twins in the show.

Too bad Aunty Becky was trying to play the education system in real life.

The Justice Department charged 33 affluent parents, which included television stars and CEOs, with participating in a detailed conspiracy to get their kids into elite schools. The scheme included cheating on the SAT and ACT, as well as parents paying coaches “enormous sums” to accept students who’s athletic credentials weren’t realistic.

In some instances, coaches agreed to pretend that students applying to their school were highly recruited athletes, when in actuality, the student didn’t even compete in that specific sport.

Along with parents, people who have been charged include two ACT and SAT exam administrators, one exam proctor and one college administrator.

At the core of the case was an admissions consultant named William Rick Singer, according to federal prosecutors. They say he ran a college counseling organization called “The Key,” which accepted more than $25 million in payments from parents from 2011 to February 2019.

Singer is accused of funneling money to coaches and other education officials to guarantee students’ admission into top schools like Georgetown, Yale, Stanford, the University of Southern California and Wake Forest University.

According to NBC News, Loughlin and her fashion designer husband Mossimo Giannulli agreed to pay $500,000 in bribes to boost their two daughters’ chances of getting admitted into USC, according to court papers.

Loughlin even allegedly told a cooperating witness that she would arrange for one of her daughters to pose in a rowing machine in order to boost the false claim that she was the crew coxswain for the L.A. Marine Club team.

Loughlin was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services fraud.

Felicity Huffman of Desperate Housewives fame was also an actress charged in the conspiracy. She and her husband, actor William H. Macy, allegedly paid $15,000 to get one of their daughters unlimited time for her SAT exam. Huffman faces the same charges as Loughlin. Her husband, however, wasn’t charged, whereas Loghlin and her husband were both charged in the scandal.

And people didn’t waste time ridiculing the T.V. stars for their dishonest endeavors. Loughlin especially got a lot of heat when the Full House references came flying.

People even brought up episodes where Aunt Becky ended up behind bars and when Uncle Jesse helped DJ cheat on her SAT test.

But of course, there were some who wouldn’t let their childhood sitcom icon go out like this.

Hit the next pages for more humorous tweets in response to the college scandal news.

And if you’re in school, stay woke. You might be studying next to a student with rich no-good lying parents.

How Ruuude: Folks Reevaluate ‘Full House’ Episodes After “Aunt Becky” Is Caught In College Bribery Scandal was originally published on globalgrind.com</s>BOSTON — A fast-moving college admissions scandal moved from bombshell indictments to guilty pleas in a matter of hours, yet the full fallout from the federal case against the rich and famous could take months or more to unfold.

Big names such as actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin headline the list of some 50 people charged in documents released Tuesday that describe a scheme to cheat the admissions process at eight sought-after schools. The parents bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into selective schools, authorities said.

At the center of the scheme was admissions consultant William "Rick" Singer, founder of the Edge College & Career Network of Newport Beach, California, authorities said. Singer pleaded guilty and his lawyer, Donald Heller, said his client intends to cooperate fully with prosecutors and is "remorseful and contrite and wants to move on with his life."

RELATED: College bribery allegations stunning to those who work in the industry

Prosecutors said that parents paid Singer big money from 2011 up until just last month to bribe coaches and administrators to falsely make their children look like star athletes to boost their chances of getting accepted. The consultant also hired ringers to take college entrance exams for students, and paid off insiders at testing centers to correct students' answers.

Some parents spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and some as much as $6.5 million to guarantee their children's admission, officials said.

"These parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege," U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said.

At least nine athletic coaches and 33 parents were charged. Dozens, including Huffman, the Emmy-winning star of ABC's "Desperate Housewives," were arrested by midday Tuesday. Huffman posted a $250,000 bond after an appearance in federal court in Los Angeles. Her husband, actor William H. Macy, has not been charged, though an FBI agent stated in an affidavit that he was in the room when Huffman first heard the pitch from a scam insider.

It was unclear when the "Full House" star Loughlin would turn herself in. Loughlin's husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, was released in Los Angeles after posting a $1 million bond.

USA TODAY reported Loughlin was due in court Wednesday. NBC News reported Loughlin had been out of the country for work.

FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2019 file photo, actress Lori Loughlin poses at the 2019 "An Unforgettable Evening" in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

The coaches worked at schools such as Yale, Stanford, Georgetown, Wake Forest, the University of Texas, the University of Southern California and the University of California at Los Angeles.

Stanford's sailing coach John Vandemoer pleaded guilty Tuesday in Boston. A former Yale soccer coach pleaded guilty before the documents went public and helped build the case against others.

No students were charged, with authorities saying that in many cases the teenagers were unaware of what was going on. Several of the colleges involved made no mention of taking any action against the students.

Several defendants, including Huffman, were charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

"For every student admitted through fraud, an honest and genuinely talented student was rejected," Lelling said.

Lelling said the investigation is continuing and authorities believe other parents were involved. The IRS is also investigating, since some parents allegedly disguised the bribes as charitable donations.

The colleges themselves are not targets, the prosecutor said. A number of the institutions moved quickly to fire or suspend the coaches and distance their name from the scandal, portraying themselves as victims. Stanford fired the sailing coach, and USC dropped its water polo coach and an athletic administrator. UCLA suspended its soccer coach, and Wake Forest did the same with its volleyball coach.</s>Stunning details continue to emerge in an alleged multi-million-dollar bribery plot that, just a day after exploding into public view, has exposed what federal prosecutors describe as a corrupt exchange of wealth, fame and influence for admissions to the nation’s most elite universities.

Fifty people — from Hollywood stars and top industry CEOs to college coaches and standardized test administrators — stand accused of participating in a scheme to cheat on admissions tests and admit to students to leading institutions as athletes regardless of their abilities, prosecutors revealed Tuesday in a federal indictment. The scandal is being called the largest college admissions scam ever prosecuted.

As the alleged culprits, including actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin and fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, position their defenses, the fallout continues for players across this wide-ranging case, which spans six states and raises seminal questions about how level the post-secondary playing field really is.

Still hanging in the balance is the fate of the privileged scholars, at least some of whom may not have known about their parents’ alleged acts. It was no accident that none were immediately charged, US Attorney Andrew Lelling of Massachusetts said Tuesday.

“The prime movers of this fraud” were the parents and other defendants, Lelling said, though he noted some students may face charges down the road.

Meantime, officials at universities including Yale, Stanford and Georgetown must now examine criminal claims made against key staffers, some of whom already have part ways.

Perhaps most critically, they’ll also have to answer for whether qualified students were denied entry into their programs in lieu of the children of the rich and famous.

“For every student admitted through fraud,” Lelling said, “an honest, genuinely talented student was rejected.”

Parents spent up to $6.5 million, the FBI says

The sums that authorities say the accused parents paid in bribes would, for many, finance a college education many times over.

Some spent between $200,000 and $6.5 million to guarantee admissions for their children, FBI Special Agent Joseph Bonavolonta said.

The relatives of one applicant paid $1.2 million to have the applicant falsely described as the co-captain of a well-known California soccer team, although the applicant did not play competitive soccer, prosecutors said.

By comparison, the average annual cost of tuition and fees at a private, four-year college is $29,478, the US Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics’ most recent report shows.

“This case is about the widening corruption of elite college admissions through the steady application of wealth combined with fraud,” Lelling said. “There can be no separate college admission system for the wealthy, and I’ll add that there will not be a separate criminal justice system either.”

The ringleader got $25 million, US attorney says

Much of the indictment revolves around William Rick Singer, the founder of a for-profit college counseling and preparation business known as The Key.

“OK, so, who we are … what we do is we help the wealthiest families in the US get their kids into school,” Singer told one parent, according to prosecutors.

There were dual avenues for carrying out the scheme, Lelling explained.

“There were essentially two kinds of fraud that Singer was selling,” Lelling said of the accusations, which run from 2011 to 2019. “One was to cheat on the SAT or ACT, and the other was to use his connections with Division I coaches and use bribes to get these parents’ kids into school with fake athletic credentials.”

For example, Singer and his co-conspirators used photo-editing technology to superimpose the face of a patron’s student onto stock photos of athletes, prosecutors said.

Singer was paid roughly $25 million by parents to help their children get in to schools, the US attorney said.

Singer pleaded guilty on Tuesday to racketeering conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy, conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruction of justice, prosecutors said.

Best known for her role on TV’s “Desperate Housewives,” Huffman is accused of paying $15,000 to Singer’s fake charity, the Key Worldwide Foundation, to facilitate cheating for her daughter on the SATs, the complaint says.

Her daughter received a 1420 on her test, which was 400 points higher than a PSAT taken a year earlier without the same administrator, the complaint states.

Huffman also discussed the scheme in a recorded phone call with a cooperating witness, the complaint says.

Huffman has been charged with felony conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services mail fraud, according to federal court documents filed Monday in Massachusetts. She was arrested without incident at her California home, the FBI said.

She appeared Tuesday in federal court in Los Angeles, where a judge set her bond at $250,000 and federal agents took her passport. Her next court appearance was set for March 29 in Boston.

Loughlin, who played Aunt Becky on “Full House,” faces the same felony charge. Her husband, Giannulli, was also charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services mail fraud.

Loughlin and Giannulli allegedly agreed to pay bribes totaling $500,000 in exchange for having their two daughters designated as recruits to the University of Southern California crew team, even though they did not participate in crew, the complaint said.

The money was given to Singer’s fake charity, and in a recorded phone call, Singer clarified that the money was actually intended for getting their daughters into USC crew, according to the complaint.

Giannulli appeared in court Tuesday, where a magistrate judge set a $1 million bond and ordered him to surrender his passport.

Though she was not present in court, prosecutors and Loughlin’s attorneys agreed on similar terms, as well as permission for her to travel to Vancouver and back for work.

CNN has contacted Iconix Brand Group, which owns Giannulli’s namesake fashion company, Mossimo. CNN also is seeking comment from the actresses’ representatives.

Coaches from Yale, Stanford, Wake Forest and Georgetown universities and USC, among others, are implicated in the case.

“The Department of Justice believes that Yale has been the victim of a crime perpetrated by a former coach who no longer works at the university,” Yale’s president said in a statement. “The corrupt behavior alleged by the Department of Justice is an affront to our university’s deeply held values of inclusion and fairness.”

The Georgetown coach who was arrested “has not coached our tennis team since December 2017, when he was placed on leave after the Office of Undergraduate Admissions identified irregularities in his recruitment practices and the University initiated an internal investigation,” a university spokeswoman said in a statement.

USC is reviewing the school’s application process, officials said.</s>(CNN) Prosecutors call it "a conspiracy nationwide in scope." Dozens of parents, sports coaches and college prep executives have been indicted for trying to get students into prestigious colleges.</s>New details continue to emerge about the alleged college cheating scheme involving Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin.

On Tuesday, March 12, E! News obtained court documents which show that both Huffman and Loughlin have been charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services mail fraud. The Desperate Housewives alum and the Fuller House star are among over 40 individuals who have been charged in connection with the scandal. According to the FBI affidavit, the scheme involved getting students admitted into elite colleges.

"Beginning in or about 2011, and continuing through the present, the defendants—principally individuals whose high-school aged children were applying to college—conspired with others to use bribery and other forms of fraud to facilitate their children's admission to colleges and universities in the District of Massachusetts and elsewhere, including Yale University, Stanford University, the University of Texas, the University of Southern California, and the University of California – Los Angeles, among others," the affidavit states.</s>BOSTON — A fast-moving college admissions scandal moved from bombshell indictments to guilty pleas in a matter of hours, yet the full fallout from the federal case against the rich and famous could take months or more to unfold.

Big names such as actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin headline the list of some 50 people charged in documents released Tuesday that describe a scheme to cheat the admissions process at eight sought-after schools. The parents bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into selective schools, authorities said.

At the center of the scheme was admissions consultant William "Rick" Singer, founder of the Edge College & Career Network of Newport Beach, California, authorities said. Singer pleaded guilty and his lawyer, Donald Heller, said his client intends to cooperate fully with prosecutors and is "remorseful and contrite and wants to move on with his life."

RELATED: College bribery allegations stunning to those who work in the industry

Prosecutors said that parents paid Singer big money from 2011 up until just last month to bribe coaches and administrators to falsely make their children look like star athletes to boost their chances of getting accepted. The consultant also hired ringers to take college entrance exams for students, and paid off insiders at testing centers to correct students' answers.

Some parents spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and some as much as $6.5 million to guarantee their children's admission, officials said.

"These parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege," U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said.

At least nine athletic coaches and 33 parents were charged. Dozens, including Huffman, the Emmy-winning star of ABC's "Desperate Housewives," were arrested by midday Tuesday. Huffman posted a $250,000 bond after an appearance in federal court in Los Angeles. Her husband, actor William H. Macy, has not been charged, though an FBI agent stated in an affidavit that he was in the room when Huffman first heard the pitch from a scam insider.

It was unclear when the "Full House" star Loughlin would turn herself in. Loughlin's husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, was released in Los Angeles after posting a $1 million bond.

USA TODAY reported Loughlin was due in court Wednesday. NBC News reported Loughlin had been out of the country for work.

FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2019 file photo, actress Lori Loughlin poses at the 2019 "An Unforgettable Evening" in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

The coaches worked at schools such as Yale, Stanford, Georgetown, Wake Forest, the University of Texas, the University of Southern California and the University of California at Los Angeles.

Stanford's sailing coach John Vandemoer pleaded guilty Tuesday in Boston. A former Yale soccer coach pleaded guilty before the documents went public and helped build the case against others.

No students were charged, with authorities saying that in many cases the teenagers were unaware of what was going on. Several of the colleges involved made no mention of taking any action against the students.

Several defendants, including Huffman, were charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

"For every student admitted through fraud, an honest and genuinely talented student was rejected," Lelling said.

Lelling said the investigation is continuing and authorities believe other parents were involved. The IRS is also investigating, since some parents allegedly disguised the bribes as charitable donations.

The colleges themselves are not targets, the prosecutor said. A number of the institutions moved quickly to fire or suspend the coaches and distance their name from the scandal, portraying themselves as victims. Stanford fired the sailing coach, and USC dropped its water polo coach and an athletic administrator. UCLA suspended its soccer coach, and Wake Forest did the same with its volleyball coach.</s>BOSTON (Reuters) - Nearly 50 people, including actors Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin were charged on Tuesday in what federal authorities say was a $25 million scam to help wealthy Americans get their children into elite universities like Yale and Stanford.

The most sweeping college admissions fraud scheme ever unearthed in the United States was masterminded at a small college-preparation company based in Newport Beach, California, prosecutors said. It relied on bribes to coaches, phony test takers and even doctored photos misrepresenting non-athletic applicants as elite competitors to gain admissions for the offspring of rich parents.

“These parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege,” Andrew Lelling, the U.S. attorney in Boston, said at a news conference. “For every student admitted through fraud, an honest, genuinely talented student was rejected.”

William “Rick” Singer, 58, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to charges related to running the scheme through his Edge College & Career Network, which charged from $100,000 to as much as $2.5 million per child for the services, which were masked as contributions to a scam charity Singer runs.

“I was essentially buying or bribing the coaches for a spot,” Singer said as he pleaded guilty to charges including racketeering, money laundering and obstruction of justice. “And that occurred very frequently.”

Dressed in a dark sweater blazer, wearing glasses, her hair in a ponytail, Huffman, best known for her role in the TV series, “Desperate Housewives,” was among around 20 defendants who appeared in a Los Angeles court.

Many were slumped in chairs and one woman tried to hide her face. Huffman’s actor husband William H. Macy, known for roles in movies such as “Fargo” and the hit TV series “Shameless”, sat in the front row of court wearing a gray sweater coat.

Magistrate Judge Alexander MacKinnon ordered Huffman’s release on a $250,000 bond before a March 29 hearing in Boston.

All the defendants who appeared in the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles were likely to be released on bond, Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, said in an email.

Macy has not been charged in the case, but Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Schleifer told the court he was a “subject of the investigation.”

Loughlin’s husband Mossimo Giannulli, a fashion designer known for his “Mossimo” brand, sat in court wearing a hooded sweatshirt and close-cropped hair. He was released on a $1 million bond. Loughlin, best known for her role in the ABC sitcom “Full House” and the recent Netflix sequel “Fuller House,” has also been charged.

Huffman, Giannulli and Loughlin have yet to enter pleas.

LATEST COLLEGE SCANDAL

The case was the latest in a series of scandals that have rocked the high-stakes, high-stress world of admissions to top colleges. Prosecutors in Boston in recent years have also charged Chinese nationals with cheating on entrance exams, while the College Board, which administers the SAT tests, was rocked in 2016 by a security breach that exposed hundreds of questions planned for tests.

Some 300 law enforcement agents swept across the country to make arrests in what agents code-named “Operation Varsity Blues.”

Prosecutors have so far named 33 parents, 13 coaches and associates of Singer’s business.

Other parents charged include Manuel Henriquez, the chief executive of specialty finance lender Hercules Capital Inc; Gordon Caplan, the co-chairman of international law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher; Bill McGlashan Jr., who heads a buyout investment arm of private equity firm TPG Capital; and Douglas Hodge, the former CEO of the investment management firm Pimco.

Representatives for the companies, and for Huffman and Loughlin, either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment.

The alleged masterminds of scam and parents who paid into it could all face up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

On a call with a wealthy parent, prosecutors said, Singer summed up his business: “What we do is help the wealthiest families in the U.S. get their kids into school.”

No students have been charged and authorities said some of them were unaware of the scams.

Prosecutors said it was up to the universities what to do with students admitted through cheating.

Actor Felicity Huffman departs an initial hearing for defendants in a racketeering case involving the allegedly fraudulent admission of children to elite universities, at the U.S. federal courthouse in downtown Los Angeles, California, U.S., March 12, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Blake

Yale University and the University of Southern California (USC) said that they were cooperating with investigators.

“The Department of Justice believes that Yale has been the victim of a crime perpetrated by its former women’s soccer coach,” Yale said in a statement.

The coach, Rudolph Meredith, resigned in November after 24 years running the women’s soccer team. Meredith, who is accused of accepting a $400,000 bribe from Singer, is due to plead guilty, prosecutors said. His lawyer declined to comment.

John Vandemoer, a former Stanford University sailing coach who worked with Singer, pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy on Tuesday.

LEARNING DISABILITIES

Prosecutors said the scheme began in 2011 and also helped children get into the University of Texas, Georgetown University, Wake Forest University and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

Part of the scheme involved advising parents to lie to test administrators that their child had learning disabilities that allowed them extra exam time.

The parents were then advised to choose one of two test centers that Singer’s company said it had control over: one in Houston, Texas, and the other in West Hollywood, California.

Test administrators in those centers are accused of taking bribes of tens of thousands of dollars to allow Singer’s clients to cheat, often by arranging to have wrong answers corrected or having another person take the exam. Singer would agree with parents beforehand roughly what score they wanted the child to get.

In many cases, the students were not aware that their parents had arranged for the cheating, prosecutors said, although in other cases they knowingly took part. None of the children were charged on Tuesday.

Singer also helped parents stage photographs of their children playing sports or even Photoshopped children’s faces onto images of athletes downloaded from the internet to exaggerate their athletic credentials.

Wake Forest said it had placed head volleyball coach Bill Ferguson on administrative leave after he was among the coaches accused of accepting bribes.

Slideshow (13 Images)

According to the criminal complaint, investigators heard McGlashan of TPG Capital listening to Singer tell him to send along pictures of his son playing sports that he could digitally manipulate to make a fake athletic profile.

“The way the world works these days is unbelievable,” McGlashan said to Singer, according to court papers.
A college admission scheme across the United States results in the indictment of over 50 people including athletic coaches, CEOs, and two Hollywood actresses, accused of using bribery and fraud in order to cheat their children into universities such as Yale and Stanford.