Parents Punch Back: College Admission Scandal Defendants Mount Aggressive Defense, Preparing For "War"

On the same day that it was reported that Lori Loughlin's daughter may be the first student facing criminal charges in the college admissions scandal, it's also looking increasingly like many parents involved are preparing to fight the charges against them vigorously, according to Bloomberg. Some of the parents, including former TPG executive Bill McGlashan, ex-Pimco chief Douglas Hodge and TV sitcom veteran Lori Loughlin are assembling aggressive defenses, while others have already punched back. Many of the parents have the money to put up a serious legal fight on multiple fronts, which could make the case more than an open-and-shut formality for the government.

Peter Henning, a former federal prosecutor who teaches at Wayne State University Law School in Detroit said: “When you take on well-heeled clients, you’re inevitably inviting a battle. This is not going to be easy for the government.”

As a start, many of the defendants' lawyers have already complained that prosecutors had engaged in judge-shopping for the case. They also added that their clients should not be tried with others whom they have never met.

Ilene Jaroslaw, former NY federal prosecutor, called the defense lawyers’ letter “a declaration of war.”

This past Monday, lawyers for Gregory and Amy Colburn of Palo Alto sought a dismissal of the two charges against them of a mail and wire fraud conspiracy and a money-laundering conspiracy. Among the couple's arguments was the notion that the government’s case is deficient.

They invoked a Supreme Court case from 1946 to argue their point. Kotteakos v. U.S. was a case where a broker was accused of conspiring with 32 loan applicants to defraud the government. The court reversed the convictions, ruling that the defendants had only the broker in common, not one another, and that there were more than eight separate conspiracies, instead of just one.

Henning continued: “This is where conspiracy law gets nebulous. It’s not clear any of the other parents knew anyone else was doing it.”

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-18/parents-punch-back-college-admission-scandal-defendants-mount-aggressive-defense

Rush Limbaugh says Mueller report should read: 'Trump attempted to obstruct our coup'

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/apr/18/rush-limbaugh-says-mueller-report-should-read-trum/

Mystery Surcharge Among Taxes, Fees Added To Gasoline In California

BERKELEY (KPIX 5) — A University of California, Berkeley professor is drawing attention to a gasoline “mystery surcharge” in the state – unexplained price increases in gasoline which have cost drivers $20 billion since 2015.

Severin Borenstein, professor at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and former chairman of the state’s Petroleum Market Advisory Committee, has spent several years crunching the numbers, trying to account for the state’s gas prices, some of the highest in the country.

“I’m very confident in the calculations, it’s really basic arithmetic,” said Borenstein.

The surcharges began in 2015, when the refinery explosion in Torrance caused what was expected to be a temporary spike in gas prices, according to Borenstein. However, the surcharge remained ever since.

“Starting in 2015, they were about 40 cents above where you would expect them to be in 2015. And in 2016, ’17, and ’18, they were between 25 and 30 cents higher than what you would expect,” said Borenstein. “In total, that amounts to paying an extra $20 billion in gasoline since February 2015.

“It’s a payment that’s not going to the government, it’s going to the sellers. Where in the distribution chain it’s ending up, we don’t know. It could be it’s going to refiners. It could be that it’s going to the middle men who buy and sell gasoline along the way. The pipeline owners, the distributors, the retailers, all of them, or some of them could be getting some of that $20 billion. And it could be that it’s covering a legitimate cost, but we should find out what that extra cost is, because it wasn’t there for the previous 15 years.”

In January, 19 state legislators sent a letter to Attorney General Xavier Becerra asking him to lead a formal investigation. Becerra has not publicly commented and the state Department of Justice typically does not announce investigations.

“So something is going on the California gasoline market. It could be that there are fewer manufacturers making California gasoline. It could be that it’s become more difficult to import gasoline because of some problem at the ports or with the pipelines or storage tanks. It seems like the state putting in some real resources to find out is well worth it.”

Borenstein estimates that since 2015, each California driver has spent about $500 on the mystery surcharges, which amounts to $11 million per day, and $4 billion per year.

“If that extra cost is due to some government regulation or policy, we need to look into whether that is something we can alter in a way that we don’t have to pay more for gasoline,” he said.

https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2019/04/18/mystery-surcharge-taxes-fees-gasoline-california/

>>6233873

Is there any reason to keep him around?

>>6233961

Just prop up a cardboard RR next time, nobody will know the difference, kek!

>>6233961

State of CA govt is proper fucked!

>>6233671

It's the way of Evil.

Ugly is beautiful…

Marry for money and power.

Control is everything, not love.