Admissions scam sending CEO to jail
BOSTON — Most of the parents charged in the nation’s largest college admissions scandal were accused of paying to cheat on admissions exams or bribing coaches to get one child into college, or perhaps two.
But prosecutors said Douglas Hodge, retired CEO of bond giant Pimco, was in a different class, paying bribes to get no fewer than four of his seven children into elite schools and attempting to do so with a fifth child.
On Friday, a federal judge sentenced Hodge, who pleaded guilty to two counts — money laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and honest services mail and wire fraud — to nine months in prison. It was the heaviest punishment for any parent who has been sentenced in the admissions scandal, though it fell considerably short of the two years that prosecutors had recommended.
The judge said that were it not for Hodge’s record of philanthropy and other good works, he would have sentenced him to more than a year in prison.
Twenty parents have pleaded guilty, and now 14 have been sentenced, with punishments for the other parents ranging from no prison time to six months behind bars. An additional 15 parents have pleaded not guilty.
Over more than a decade, prosecutors said, Hodge paid $850,000 in bribes — $325,000 to a Georgetown University tennis coach to have his eldest daughter and son admitted to that school as tennis recruits and $525,000 to have another daughter and son admitted to the University of
Southern California as recruits in soccer and football with fabricated qualifications.
At least three of Hodge’s children have already graduated from the schools they were admitted to. Prosecutors said three of Hodge’s children had gained some insight into the scheme when it was happening. Hodge and his lawyers said his children were unaware and not involved.
Hodge’s lawyers described how Hodge gave away more than $30 million to causes including charter schools in California and an orphanage in Cambodia.