CAUGHT IN SCANDAL’S WAKE Stanford sailing coach was an ‘unwitting pawn’ in Varsity Blues
JOHN Vandemoer still remembers the call he got on Oct. 5, 2018.
It was from William “Rick” Singer, a college placement counselor. Vandemoer had been working as Stanford University’s sailing coach since 2009 and Singer regularly connected him with applicants hoping to join the sailing program, who also happened to have parents with deep pockets.
Singer said that a prospective student had opted to go with Vanderbilt instead “and they’re not going to make their fivehundred-thousand payment to you,” he explained. The donation had been originally promised as a gift to the sailing program, Vandemoer says —not as a bribe to ensure a coveted spot at the prestigious school.
“But I’m still going to be supportive,” Singer continued. “I will figure out what can make sense so I can pay you. One-hundred — maybe two-hundred-thousand. Would that be OK?” He ended up sending Vandemoer a check for $160,000.
Singer said that it was a way to “keep our relationship alive,” and told him to consider it “a deposit for the next year’s kid.”
Looking back, Vandemoer thought it was an unusual choice of words, but as he says in his new memoir, “Rigged Justice: How the College Admissions Scandal Ruined an Innocent Man’s Life” (HarperOne), he believed he had been taking money from Singer on behalf of families simply as donations, unrelated to whether kids were accepted by Stanford. He said he never thought the two were linked.
Small, non-revenue-generating college sports like sailing “lived and died on donations,” Vandemoer writes. “And as the head coach, I was responsible for bringing much of that money in.”
He would eventually haul in $610,000 from Singer. A chunk of it came from one family whose daughter didn’t even end up joining the sailing club, but mostly it arrived from Singer as “deposits,” Vandemoer writes.
But in February 2019, special agents from the IRS and FBI knocked on Vandemoer’s
door, flashing their badges and telling him he was under investigation.
He learned that his calls with Singer had been recorded by the FBI, as part of an investigation called “Operation Varsity Blues.” Fifty-three people — nine coaches and thirty-three parents, including celebrities Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin — would soon be charged with taking part in a conspiracy, aided by Singer, to bribe college officials at prestigious universities like Yale, UCLA, USC and Georgetown.
Vandemoer, 41 at the time, was the very first person to be charged, accused of accepting $610,000 in bribes in exchange for giving preferential treatment to applicants, regardless of their experience, to be recruited for Stanford’s sailing team. If convicted, he faced a maximum of 60 years behind bars.
In March 2019, a federal judge sentenced him to two years of probation, including six months of home confinement, and a $10,000 fine.
Now, as he has finished his house-arrest sentence for his involvement in the college-admissions scandal, this is what Vandemoer knows he should have said to Singer: “What are you talking about, Rick? What do you mean a deposit for next year’s kid? Why is it a deposit?”
VANDEMOER grew up on Cape Cod, Mass., sailing at the Hyannis Yacht Club and dreaming of competing at the Olympics. He gave up as a player and became the youngest varsity head coach at the US Naval Academy, eventually joining Stanford in 2009 when they offered him the position of head sailing coach.
During all his coaching years, he had never gotten a call from a recruiter before, and “it wasn’t even on my radar to be alert or protective,” he told The Post. He was aware of scandals in other sports, like the NCAA men’s basketball corruption scandal of 2017, when the FBI arrested college coaches for bribery and money laundering. “But that would never happen to a sport like sailing or water polo,” he said.
Stanford didn’t offer much guidance on the subject, he said. School Athletics Director Bernard Muir only congratulated him on the considerable donations, Vandemoer claims, and asked vague questions like, “You didn’t do anything for it, right?”
“I’d received zero training about the ethics or legality of donations,” Vandemoer writes. “My assumption, mistaken I now know, was that any major contribution would trigger a thorough investigation.” Instead, when he mentioned the donations to top officials at Stanford, “they were like, ‘This is good! Keep going!’ ”
Singer also gave him little reason to worry. “He said explicitly that there were no strings attached” to donations, Vandemoer said. “He wanted to support the sailing program. That was it.”
Vandemoer used the money to pay for new boats and trips to the East Coast for regattas. He was also looking for athletes who weren’t superstars. And Singer provided him with a string of promising players he could mold.
“I have no problem recruiting A-plus players,” he told Singer. “I have too many. I mean, they can’t all start, right? And then they get annoyed. They hate sitting on the bench.”
For example, in early 2018, Bodhi Patel was a Stanford prospect with limited sailing experience whose family was “very affluent,” Singer explained to Vandemoer. “I’m sure they would help your program if he gets in.” He eventually opted for a different school and the family never donated, but Vandemoer was intrigued.
“Bodhi needed me more than I needed him, and that in itself was appealing,” writes Vandemoer. “Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing to have a player who was not outstanding but was hungry for a chance.”
When Vandemoer learned that he was being investigated by the FBI, it was a shock. “My players heard me say it day after day: nothing mattered more than honor and integrity,” he writes. “I’d made kids forfeit races even when they’d ‘gotten away’ with a rules violation on the course.” He remembers an argument he once had with his wife Molly about whether it was ethical to take the tags off a new mattress. “We can’t,” he told her. “It says it’s illegal.” His lawyer, Robert Fisher, told him he probably didn’t stand a chance of beating the charges. Legal fees would cost him in the millions, and even if he won, “you probably won’t have your job,” Fisher said. “That’s what winning looks like.”
He was offered a plea bargain, which he didn’t want to take. “I’m pleading guilty to something I didn’t do,” he told his lawyer. But he had no choice. “The second that I was accused of bribery and fraud by the government, my career was over,” he said. “There was just no turning back.”
According to a 2018 Pew Research Center study, more than 90 percent of people charged with federal crimes plead guilty, and most take plea deals. “Of the 2 percent who actually go to trial, fewer than 1 percent win their cases,” writes Vandemoer.
So he took the plea deal. His sentence was far less than the 13 months in prison recommended by prosecutors. But during sentencing, the judge noted that among those accused in the scandal, she had “not heard of anyone who is less culpable.”
Vandemoer, 43, ended his house arrest in 2019 and returned to being a sailing coach, although only independently and only for kids between 10 and 13 years old. He also started a new career as a project manager at Water Solutions, an engineering firm in Half Moon Bay, Calif., that specializes in the management of potable water.
He still lives with the memory of what happened, replaying what he could have done or said to Singer before it was too late. But he’s less angry at Singer or the prosecutors who brought him down than he is at Stanford. In particular, he felt that Muir could have done more to protect him.
“I could have asked more questions,” said Vandemoer. “But how would I have even known to ask more questions? I assumed the university thoroughly vetted all gifts. That was not my job.”
The worst came when the FBI closed in and, he said, Stanford didn’t support him.
“Even after hearing that I took none of the money for myself, that all the money went to them, nobody said, ‘Hey, maybe we should hear this guy’s story,’ ” Vandemoer said. “Nope. They didn’t want anything to do with me.”
The university denies his account, claiming in a statement that Vandemoer “never spoke to the athletic director or any other senior person in Athletics about Singer.” But officials also stated in an external review that the school needed “new or more formalized procedures” to ward off future misconduct.
Vandemoer is much happier with his new job. “I don’t wanna work for a corporation that treats employees like they’re expendable,” he said. “I’m in a firm with five people that I completely trust, who support each other and if we have a problem, we don’t e-mail it. We talk to each other.”
He laughs. “It’s funny,” Vandemoer said. “That’s exactly what I used to tell my students. It’s what I thought we stood for, having tough conversations when we needed to have them and treating each other with respect and loyalty. But Stanford didn’t do that for me.”