Actress Felicity Huffman Was Released from Federal Prison
Actress Felicity Huffman was released Friday morning from a federal prison in California on the 11th day of a 14-day sentence for her role in the college admissions scandal, authorities said.
The “Desperate Housewives” star was released from the low-security prison for women because, under prison policy, inmates scheduled for weekend release are let out on Friday, the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said.
JUST IN | Felicity Huffman who admitted paying $15,000 to rig her daughter’s SAT in the college admissions bribery scandal was released from federal prison.https://t.co/wzttY2GU9j
— New York Daily News (@NYDailyNews) October 25, 2019
It wasn’t immediately clear why she was released Friday because Monday would have been the 14th day of her term.
Her husband, actor William H. Macy, dropped off Huffman aka inmate No. 77806-112 at the Federal Correctional Institution, Dublin in the San Francisco Bay Area on Oct. 15.
A federal judge in Boston last month sentenced Huffman, 56, to two weeks in prison, a $30,000 fine, 250 hours of community service and a year’s probation after she pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy for paying an admissions consultant $15,000 to have a proctor correct her daughter’s SAT answers.
The Emmy-award winning actress tearfully apologized at her sentencing, saying, “I was frightened.
I was stupid, and I was so wrong.”
Huffman was the first parent sentenced in a scandal involving dozens of wealthy parents accused of bribing their children’s way into elite universities or cheating on college entrance exams.
Other parents in the far-reaching scandal could face far stiffer sentences.
On Tuesday, a grand jury in Boston indicted “Full House” actress Lori Loughlin, her fashion designer husband Mossimo Giannuli and nine other parents on new charges of trying to bribe officials at an organization that receives at least $10,000 in federal funding.
Loughlin and Giannulli have pleaded not guilty.
The charge of conspiracy to commit federal program bribery carries a maximum sentence of up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
The scheme, the biggest college admissions case ever prosecuted by the Justice Department, which has shown how far some will go to get their children into top universities like Stanford and Yale.
Huffman’s prison has been described by media as “Club Fed,” making its way onto a Forbes list in 2009 of “America’s 10 Cushiest Prisons.”
It has housed well-known inmates in the past, including “Hollywood Madam” Heidi Fleiss.
Representatives for the actress said when she entered that she would share a room and open toilet with three other inmates and would be subject to five-bed checks a day while having access to a gym, library and TV room.
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Prison officials would not provide specific information on Huffman but said she would follow all the same rules and guidelines as other inmates.
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