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Post by holidayhusker on May 15, 2019 17:34:56 GMT -5
or maybe you are not real bright. Why waste tax payer resources on white collar criminals when they could do far more good by being forced to donate heavily to others not so fortunate. Do you really think prison for 6 months is the " moral," thing to do? COME ON. So rich people can avoid prison by paying fines to society, but poor people must go to prison? If the government forcing rich people to pay money to help those less fortunate is such a good thing, shouldn't we just raise taxes on rich people? They we can get it both ways ... their money will help pay for things needed by the less fortunate, and we can still toss them into prison like anyone else if they commit crimes. SO GARRISON...its ok to let rapist run around on the streets after a few months punishment but that horrible Felicity Huffman deserves a year in prison for paying a guy to get her kid in college? Is that what your saying Garrison.
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Post by holidayhusker on May 15, 2019 17:36:19 GMT -5
I have a bright idea! How about we send criminals to prison? No early release. No time off for good behavior. You behave well and we don't put you in the hole! There will be a whole lot less crime when we quit letting the criminals try to function in society. yet you don't mind a record number of prisoners being paid for by the hard working taxpayers for white collar crimes?
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Post by mikegarrison on May 15, 2019 17:37:27 GMT -5
So rich people can avoid prison by paying fines to society, but poor people must go to prison? If the government forcing rich people to pay money to help those less fortunate is such a good thing, shouldn't we just raise taxes on rich people? They we can get it both ways ... their money will help pay for things needed by the less fortunate, and we can still toss them into prison like anyone else if they commit crimes. SO GARRISON...its ok to let rapist run around on the streets after a few months punishment but that horrible Felicity Huffman deserves a year in prison for paying a guy to get her kid in college? Is that what your saying Garrison. What a strange (and obvious) strawman argument. I certainly never said "it is OK to let rapists out after a few months".
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Post by volleyguy on May 15, 2019 17:43:51 GMT -5
It's an unenforceable contract. Georgetown could offer a refund, but they're under no obligation to do so if the contract is indeed invalid. They could probably also argue that the fraud caused them to expended resources, and ask for the equivalent in tuition as compensation or damages. Obviously, the student realizes he is going to end up with three years wasted and has nothing to lose, but the idea in such an interpretation is to encourage honest negotiations and not reward dishonest ones. I'm not disputing the law with you -- as I recall you are a lawyer. But it just fundamentally seems wrong. If they want to take away all his credits, they should have to give him back his tuition money. I guess maybe it depends on whether you think the basic contract is $$$ for education (and credits are a bonus) or whether it is $$$ for credits. I would suggest that the proliferation of free college courses on the web is an argument that colleges are willing to provide education for free, and what you pay for is the accreditation. I think the purpose of the lawsuit--as brazen as it may seem--is to "shame" Georgetown into some sort of compromise, either the credits or a refund. As I said, the kid has absolutely nothing to lose at this point, and he has the resources to pursue the lawsuit, so he's just rolling the dice. From a legal standpoint, I think Georgetown is on fairly solid footing. Even if the student was not aware of the fraud, he was probably legally a minor at the time of the admission, which leads back to his father. The important message that most of these Universities want to send right now is that they have integrity in their admissions, and so, they must take a real tough stand. But absent any obvious evidence of knowledge or intransigence in cooperating on the student's part, I wouldn't be surprised if they ended up settling this quietly at some time in the future.
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Post by holidayhusker on May 15, 2019 17:48:50 GMT -5
SO GARRISON...its ok to let rapist run around on the streets after a few months punishment but that horrible Felicity Huffman deserves a year in prison for paying a guy to get her kid in college? Is that what your saying Garrison. What a strange (and obvious) strawman argument. I certainly never said "it is OK to let rapists out after a few months". but do to overcrowding Mike they are so...does it makes any sense at all to incarcerate those are hardly violent or dangerous criminals?
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Post by pepperbrooks on May 15, 2019 18:03:06 GMT -5
If the contract with Georgetown is null and void, shouldn’t the money exchanged be returned?
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Post by azvb on May 15, 2019 18:06:33 GMT -5
This just seems insane to me. We are going to send these people to prison yet we are talking about prison reform? Why not have them give a million dollars to a scholarship fund for low income kids? Only in America. A million dollars means nothing to most of these people. Send them to prison, but make them pay for it. Not sure what it costs the taxpayers per day per prisoner, but it would certainly add salt to the wound.
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Post by volleyguy on May 15, 2019 18:10:54 GMT -5
If the contract with Georgetown is null and void, shouldn’t the money exchanged be returned? A "void" contract is not actually a contract, so it is by definition not enforceable. A contract could be legally valid, but unenforceable (based on fraud, for example).
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2019 18:12:19 GMT -5
What a strange (and obvious) strawman argument. I certainly never said "it is OK to let rapists out after a few months". but do to overcrowding Mike they are so...does it makes any sense at all to incarcerate those are hardly violent or dangerous criminals? I think you are conflating two separate issues. This case will send people to federal prison. Any of these criminals taking a bed will not release rapists who mostly are in state pens. The 2-4 months that she is going to get is likely appropriate but it sends a terrible message to the public (the rich get away with it). They really need the first sentence to be on someone that paid to cheat on the exams plus paid a bribe to get into the school plus took the "charity" tax deduction on the bribe. Someone who did all of those things getting less than 3-5 years is an outrage. They stole from the general population but skewing the SAT/ACT scores through cheating lowering every honest persons' percentile rank. They stole a spot into a great academic institution that they did not deserve from someone that actually worked for that privilege. They stole a walk-on spot from an athlete that actually may have become great at that sport with the right coaching and opportunity. And then, without any shame, they stole 40% of their bribe from all the US taxpayers and 13% of their bribe from the CA (or slightly less in other states) taxpayers when they cheated on their taxes. In those cases, the public was robbed so these people could pay for their crimes with tax dollars. You cannot serve less than 24 months for that. It is not harmless.
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2019 18:13:54 GMT -5
If the contract with Georgetown is null and void, shouldn’t the money exchanged be returned? No, because the kid occupied a spot that an honest person could have sat in and paid. They stole from more than one party with their fraud. I think Georgetown has the correct strategy here. Keep it simple. When you applied, you signed a CONTRACT....
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Post by mikegarrison on May 15, 2019 18:24:46 GMT -5
But absent any obvious evidence of knowledge or intransigence in cooperating on the student's part, I wouldn't be surprised if they ended up settling this quietly at some time in the future. Reports say the kid offered to leave quietly as long as he could keep his credits. That offer was rejected. Reports also say that the kid actively participated in building a scam "I love tennis" portfolio. If I were on a jury, I would wonder long and hard whether it was really fair that Georgetown gets to both deny him the credits and also keep the $200K he paid for the credits. I would lean toward saying Georgetown has to return the money (or at least some of the money) if they want to deny him the credits. I think this is where his argument that Georgetown was negligent comes into play. If he was a criminal mastermind or something, then I would sympathize with Georgetown for being victimized. But he argues that Georgetown obviously didn't really care all that much about it until it turned into bad publicity for them. If they had really cared before, it would have been easy to check his references and see that they were faked.
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2019 18:31:37 GMT -5
This will be the end of my rant. What bothers me the most about this case is how it demonstrates that a huge cross-section of wealthy Americans believe education is worthless and you are just buying your kids a credential. These are not all actors, there are successful lawyers, money managers, CEOs, the guy that ran Limited or banana republic, the dude that invented hot pockets etc. For $3,000 you can send your child to an intensive SAT prep course that will raise their score a couple of hundred points AND teach them something. They could have easily hired them those best private coaches and helped them excel in an actual sport. All of these people did not care to have their children enrich themselves, they just felt the degree from USC/GT/Yale/Stanford was all their kid needed to make it in life. That is a troubling sign. It would be easy to assume they do not love their children but I do not believe that. But the alternative is also troubling, all these people believe that the things colleges value in applicants (high SAT, sports, leadership) are not really valuable to their kids' growth as a person. Else they would have done the actual actions that they obviously knew were needed since they faked them. It means that 750 very rich people (maybe more) who are not related all came to the same conclusion. They think our college application system is a complete joke. That having your kids involved in sports and studying hard to do well academically is a only for "losers" that cannot game the system. And they felt it was their right or privilege to take those spots from some other Americans' kids who actually followed the rules. And none of them lost a second of sleep over it. What else have these 750 families done to screw over the rest of America for their own personal gain? They all need to be humiliated and serve some time in prison regardless of the additional cost to us.
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Post by volleyguy on May 15, 2019 18:39:46 GMT -5
But absent any obvious evidence of knowledge or intransigence in cooperating on the student's part, I wouldn't be surprised if they ended up settling this quietly at some time in the future. Reports say the kid offered to leave quietly as long as he could keep his credits. That offer was rejected. Reports also say that the kid actively participated in building a scam "I love tennis" portfolio. If I were on a jury, I would wonder long and hard whether it was really fair that Georgetown gets to both deny him the credits and also keep the $200K he paid for the credits. I would lean toward saying Georgetown has to return the money (or at least some of the money) if they want to deny him the credits. I think this is where his argument that Georgetown was negligent comes into play. If he was a criminal mastermind or something, then I would sympathize with Georgetown for being victimized. But he argues that Georgetown obviously didn't really care all that much about it until it turned into bad publicity for them. If they had really cared before, it would have been easy to check his references and see that they were faked. The issue of whether it was an enforceable contract (and what the remedy would be) wouldn't be decided by a jury, but rather a judge. So, if this ever went to trial, a jury would probably only consider the issue of negligence. Making the argument "you were negligent because you didn't look hard enough at whether I committed fraud" is a tough sell. As far a a judge's ruling, he or she could 1) find that it is a valid contract, and then determine what the appropriate remedy is 2) find that the contract is void, or valid but unenforceable. 3) In rare circumstances, find that the contract is unenforceable, but find the outcome unconscionable (to the student) and order a remedy regardless.
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Post by mikegarrison on May 15, 2019 18:41:47 GMT -5
What else have these 750 families done to screw over the rest of America for their own personal gain? Just look at the tax code and the answer will be revealed to you.
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Post by Wolfgang on May 15, 2019 19:01:58 GMT -5
This entire fiasco is mind-boggling to me. I thought it was pretty easy to get into a good college. I kept things simple: DO homework, DO study for exams, BE a good boy (i.e., don’t kill anybody, don’t slash your neighbor’s car tires, don’t get your girlfriend pregnant and drive across the border to get an abortion), DO get involved in activities you enjoy because you enjoy them not because they look good on your resume/application, DO study for the SATs and do lots of practice exams until you start to LOVE doing practice exams (by “LOVE” I mean addiction-level) and DO talk to your teachers and share with them that you really want to go to __________ (name of school) and “can you help me?” Easy. That’s how I did it and that’s how I taught my kids to do it. We all did okay.
My wife went about it more strategically. In high school, she did some “investigative” research into the majors that were not popular or underrepresented at each school she applied to and in her application, identified those majors as her preferred Area of study even though she had no interest in, say, Medieval Studies, Islamic Studies, or Native American Studies. She got into Stanford. (She also studied hard in high school and was a cheerleader and did Student Government crap, so that helped.) She kept her promises and majored in what she said she would major in. She said it was “swell.”
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