Felicity Huffman has finally broken her silence on the college admissions scandal that landed her in jail.
The Desperate Housewives star served 11 days in a federal institution in October 2019, for her involvement in the scandal that rocked Hollywood.
The actress admitted to paying admissions consultant Rick Singer $15,000 to fix her daughter’s SAT answers, to give her a better chance of getting into college.
She pleaded guilty to charges of mail fraud and honest services mail fraud, and was sentenced to 14 days in prison, but ended up serving just 11 days.
The 60-year-old has now opened up to ABC’s Mark Brown and reflected on the time when the FBI turned up to her home to arrest the star: “They came into my home, they woke my daughters up at gunpoint – again, nothing new to the black and brown community – then they put my hands behind my back and handcuffed me.”
“I asked if I could get dressed. I thought it was a hoax. I literally turned to one of the FBI people in a flak jacket and a gun and I go ‘is this a joke?'”
“It was sort of like my daughter’s future, which meant I had to break the law.”
Felicity Huffman addresses college admissions cheating scandal for the first time in an interview with @ABC7‘s Marc Brown. @KaynaWhitworth has the story. pic.twitter.com/2GSfqinGjh
— Good Morning America (@GMA) December 1, 2023
The actress said she regretted the scheme but felt she had no choice at the time because Sophia, who she previously said had a learning disability, would not have been accepted otherwise.
Felicity continued: “It felt like I had to give my daughter a chance at a future. And so it was sort of like my daughter’s future, which meant I had to break the law.”
“I think I feel the people I owe a debt and an apology to is the academic community and to the students and the families that sacrifice and work really hard to get to where they are going legitimately.”
Felicity has decided to speak out now to highlight A New Way of Life, an organization that helps formerly incarcerated women reintegrate into society.
“I want to use my experience and what I’ve gone through and the pain to bring something good,” she said.
The mother-of-two said in her interview, that Mr. Singer informed her and her husband, William H. Macy, that Sophia would not be accepted into any schools, unless they went against the system in some way.
“After a year, he started to say your daughter is not going to get into any of the colleges that she wants to.”
“And I believed him. And so when he slowly started to present the criminal scheme, it seems like – and I know this seems crazy at the time – but that was my only option to give my daughter a future.”
“And I know hindsight is 20/20 but it felt like I would be a bad mother if I didn’t do it. So – I did it,” Felicity admitted.
Felicity also admitted that Sophia was completely unaware that someone had been paid to alter her SAT scores after they had been sat.
The criminal scheme involved Mr. Singer paying off a handful of SAT test supervisors who would change Sophia’s test scores after the exam.
Felicity reflected on the day her daughter sat her SATs and said: “She was going, ‘Can we get ice cream afterwards?’.”
“I’m scared about the test. What can we do that’s fun? And I kept thinking, turn around, just turn around. And to my undying shame, I didn’t.”
