Her or Lori Loughlin will see no jail time. But what will be interesting is seeing if other people with the same charges are sent to jail. People who are not so famous or as rich.
shareShe's obviously got enough money for a big time attorney. In a few months she'll plead guilty to a much lesser charge, non-felony.
shareBut why?. The law should be a constant, so how does a big time attorney literally negate the crime done? Unless, he knows the judge and it's a personal favor, or because a big time attorney is usually more intelligent (and can find loopholes?) In other words: the judge doesn't sit there and think : "well, you're a big time attorney, therefore, she will get a lesser charge for the sake of it".
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But her career is seriously damaged, if not ruined. And Huffman is a serious actor; Loughlin is not.
It doesn't hurt to have a smart guy who knows how to exploit the loopholes. I think the seriousness of the crime has a big part in the seriousness of the sentence. If a rich person offers a bribe to a government official who takes it, who is to blame? I'd say the governmental representative is.
shareI foresee a prison sentence, and then an early release because of "prison overcrowding".
Like, a couple of hours after she gets there.
Not much to gain by putting her in prison. What, is she a serial offender? If the system extracts $$ out of her, they've done their job.
shareThey haven't done their job by "extracting" money out of her. A fine is only compensatory. You warrant punishment whether you're a serial -offender or not, and paying a fine is not actual punishment (especially when you are worth millions, and won't miss it). Doing time in jail is punishment. If there was nothing to gain by incarceration, nobody who committed a felony would be in jail.
And with my first post, a big time-attorney is not necessarily smarter. That was the point. You shouldn't want a wrongdoer to exploit the loopholes, unless you feel soft over the fact of them being famous actresses.
This is a big topic, but concerning some people who commit victimless crimes (a malleable concept) I think society is better served by getting the $$ versus having us all pay for their incarceration. Perhaps they should spend some time in a minimum security "resort" prison, but I don't want someone's life physically ruined by being in the general prison population. I barely know who Huffman and Loughlin are.
shareIt can be jail, not a prison environment, for a certain period of time. With a fortunate and privileged-lifestyle as Loughlin, it likely wouldn't need to be a long sentence in order for her to feel punished. There is always home-arrest which I find kind of meaningless, since you're still in the comfort of your home, and only limited in your outside activities
The problem with just paying $$ is that it's really not a deterrent and does not set an example for others who may plan on commiting the same offense. To me, the words "victimless-crime" don't go together. The "victim" in a victimless-crime is any entity which you have violated, which has the repercussions of not setting an example. The government can be the victim in such crimes since you're basically guilty of perjury.
I hesitate to use the term victimless crime but I don't think the government gets victimized very often. WE are supposed to be the government, and I don't think these women have victimized me. Just the fact they are being publicly shamed seems like plenty deterrent, and the public coffers benefit. Do you really think other rich folks will be deterred from trying to get favorable placements for their kids? The real criminals are the school administrators who accept the bribes.
shareShe should have to give $1 million to underprivileged students to go to college. At least.
shareDepending on what colleges are involved, I'm thinking $1M would benefit about 25 people. Not a negligible amount, but four year schools are crazy expensive these days. I'm not sure how it's gotten this way, but if some politicians figure out how to get free upper education for those who want it get my vote.
shareSimple fact: if higher education was more affordable, most of the Republicans would never get elected.
shareWrong-o! Served 11 days.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/25/us/felicity-huffman-release/index.html
This all happened around 2019.
It looks like the acting roles dried up -- in the main -- for Huffman in the years since. Its not so much "the court of public opinion" -- its studio bosses not wanting to risk putting a disliked person in a movie.
The "nature of the wrongdoing" has varied over the years, but the list of those who have lost work include Mel Gibson, Kevin Spacey(literally REMOVED from movie scenes and replaced by Christopher Plummer), Johnny Depp, Will Smith, and Alec Baldwin.
Will any of them come back? Gibson has...but pretty much only in independent films and not at the money he used to earn.
Still, Gibson is rich(from Passion of the Christ among other things), most ALL of those folks are rich. You can make enough money in Hollywood to never have to work again.
Felicity Huffman's famous actor husband, William H. Macy, was complicit in this college scandal but not charged. He was "allowed" to stay on his streaming show "Shameless" and has landed some movies since this all occurred. Too good a character actor to pay the price?