SHOCKING REVELATIONS
The actress’ actions in the college admissions scandal have compromised her daughter’s future, her family and her own reputation
Court documents reveal Felicity Huffman’s involvement in Operation Varsity Blues, in her own words, along with the famous friends who tried to save her.
After an already agonizing six months, the days leading up to Felicity Huffman’s Sept. 13 sentencing for her role in the college admissions scandal were especially brutal. A week prior, while she and husband William H. Macy should have been happily celebrating their 22nd wedding anniversary, the star received some sobering news: The U.S. Attorney was recommending she spend a month in jail, complete a year of probation and pay a fine of $20,000.
She’d done everything in her power to avoid prison time. After being arrested at gunpoint by the FBI on March 12 and charged with fraud, a remorseful Huffman, 56, agreed to a plea deal and admitted her guilt in May. “I accept full responsibility for my actions,” she told the judge about paying Rick Singer, the mastermind behind the “Operation Varsity Blues” scandal, $15,000 to have someone correct her older daughter Sophia’s SAT answers.
Then, in letters addressed to the judge released on Sept. 6, Huffman and Macy, 69, revealed some shocking information in a desperate bid to get the courts to go easy on the Desperate Housewives star. The missives touch on everything from the severe trauma experienced by their daughters, Sophia, 19, and Georgia, 17, to Huffman’s crippling self-doubt as a mom and her uncertainty over her once super-successful acting career. “There’s no justification for what I’ve done,” writes Huffman. “But there is a bigger picture.”
IN HER OWN WORDS
Huffman says she didn’t set out to cheat. “I didn’t even know such a scheme existed,” she claims in her letter to Judge Indira Talwani. She’d linked up with Singer for guidance on getting her daughter into college, she says. Singer spent a year tutoring Sophia — a budding actress — before suggesting Huffman have a “proctor
bump up her scores.” After six weeks of mulling it over, Huffman took the offer. (She and Macy insist Sophia had no idea about their involvement.) “I also considered doing the same for Georgia,” she admits, “but I came to my senses and told him to stop the process.”
Huffman’s letter paints a picture of a mother at the end of her rope.
She says Sophia was diagnosed with learning disabilities at age 8, and that Georgia was struggling with them too. “I find Motherhood bewildering,” she writes. “From the moment my children were born… I worried. I was always searching for the right book or the right piece of advice.” Macy echoes similar sentiments in his note. “She has not carried being a mom easily,” he reveals.
FRACTURED FAMILY
Huffman’s actions caused major emotional damage to her kids, an insider tells Us: “Felicity’s relationship with Sophia has been hit extremely hard by the criminal charges.” Macy says as much in his letter — “Sophia has certainly paid the dearest price” — and Huffman too recalls the moment her older daughter confronted her in tears when she learned the truth about what her mom had done. “[She] looked at me,” Huffman writes, “and asked with tears streaming down her face, ‘Why didn’t you believe in me? Why didn’t you think I could do it on my own?’ I could only