Actress Felicity Huffman, who pleaded guilty to paying a consultant US$15,000 to inflate her elder daughter's SAT score, is facing less potential jail time — prosecutors are now recommending one month of incarceration — than many of the about three dozen parents accused of wrongdoing in the scheme.
In a separate filing, Huffman's lawyers argued that she should get no jail time but instead a year of probation, 250 hours of community service and a US$20,000 fine. They laid out for the first time a detailed narrative of how she got involved, saying that the college consultant, William Singer, worked for her family for nearly a year — providing tutors for her older daughter and building Huffman's trust — before he proposed the cheating scheme.
Huffman wrote that she decided to go through with the cheating but that it haunted her. So while she considered doing the same thing for her younger daughter, she decided against it. Regardless of any jail time they receive, many parents have suffered serious consequences. They have lost work, seen their reputations damaged and become public symbols of arrogance and greed.
Vandemoer was sentenced to only a day in jail, which was deemed already served, and six months of home confinement.