美国大学招生案一审判决帆船教练将不面临牢狱之灾

Former Stanford sailing coach（帆船教练）avoids prison（牢狱之灾） in first sentence of（被判） college admissions scandal（大学招生丑闻）

BOSTON – Former Stanford University head sailing coach John Vandemoer was sentenced Wednesday to home supervision（监督） – not prison – for his actions in n's college admissions scandal, a blow to prosecutors（检察官） who had sought to send a strong message to other defendants（被告） in the high-profile（备受瞩目的） case.






A federal judge gave Vandemoer two years of supervised release, including the first six months confined（限制） to his home, and a $10,000 fine（罚款） in the first sentencing of the "Varsity Blues" college admissions bribery（贿赂）and cheating case. 






He received a prison term（刑期） of just one day, but it was deemed（认为） already served when he was arrested in March. Prosecutors had sought 13 months of prison while Vandemoer's defense fought for probation（缓刑）over incarceration（入狱）.  






Vandemoer, 41, pleaded guilty（认罪） in March to racketeering（敲诈勒索）charges for accepting $610,000 in bribes from the admissions scheme's mastermind Rick Singer to benefit Stanford's sailing program in exchange for designating college applicants as sailing recruits to get them accepted into the prestigious（有名望的）university. 






Federal Judge Rya Zobel said it's important that Vandemoer be punished "because it's too easy to do this kind of thing" but she didn't think prison was warranted（批准）. Vandemoer funneled payments to Stanford's sailing program, not his personal use, she noted, and none of the students tied to his payments attended Stanford as a direct result of his actions.






Vandemoer, joined by his wife, parents and sister outside the courthouse after the hearing, said he takes full responsibility for his actions and accepts the consequences. 






"A big part of my coaching philosophy（哲学） has always been that it's not the mistake that defines you, but it's what you do afterwards," he said. "I'm holding true to those words now in the face of my biggest mistake."






Vandemoer is the first of the 22 defendants who have pleaded guilty in n's sweeping college admissions scandal to receive a sentence. But because of his case's unique circumstances, his sentence might not signal other defendants will also avoid prison.






Still, the judge was bluntly（直言地，坦白地） skeptical（怀疑） of the government's central case, saying that although Vandemoer certainly committed fraud against Stanford, she couldn't determine that the payments he collected were bribes under the federal commercial bribery statute（联邦政府商业贿赂法）.






关注微信订阅号：和果果一起悦读 


喜马拉雅搜索‘姐妹英文频道’收听同步音频。


请发送‘阅读材料’到订阅号后台， 获得阅读材料提取链接及密码。






我们每个工作日推送1-3篇苹果和Kalista姐妹俩的英文阅读视频。苹果阅读的材料为牛津阅读树，Reading A-Z及一些连载小说, 希望帮助带动幼儿园和低年级的小朋友们英文阅读的兴趣。Kalista阅读材料是来自英文报的新闻报道（USA Today及其他），适合高年级学生及成人， 通过读报增进对时事及北美文化生活方面的了解。