New Trial Is Ordered for Water Polo Coach Convicted in ‘Varsity Blues’ Scandal

Rachael S. Rollins, the U.S. lawyer for Massachusetts, mentioned: “We’re very disenchanted on this ruling, which we don’t consider is grounded within the details or the legislation. The jury convicted Mr. Vavic on each single rely, and we consider they received it proper. At this level, we’re reviewing all of our choices.”

For the reason that indictments had been introduced in 2019, the federal government has confused that the schools concerned weren’t implicated within the scandal. Nonetheless, the scandal has put an unsavory mild on athletic recruitment, exposing how it may be entwined with fund-raising.

In a 60-page choice, the decide mentioned the jury had reached an inexpensive verdict. However she did discover that the federal government might need launched sufficient confusion into the minds of the jury as to warrant a brand new trial.

In the course of the trial, Mr. Vavic’s attorneys mentioned he had by no means misappropriated any cash or dedicated any fraud. They mentioned that about $100,000 of the money had been deposited right into a U.S.C. account for the water polo groups. One other $120,000 went to pay personal college tuition for his sons — cash they mentioned had come within the type of scholarships from Mr. Singer’s basis.

Prosecutors mentioned the muse had been a conduit for bribery.

The order for a brand new trial additionally put wind within the sails of one other defendant, John Wilson, a former govt at Staples and Hole and the founding father of an actual property and personal fairness agency. Mr. Wilson is interesting his conviction on fees of paying greater than $1.2 million to make sure that his three youngsters can be admitted to the College of Southern California, Harvard College and Stanford College as Division I athletic recruits — though prosecutors mentioned they’d not have certified based mostly on their athletic credentials.

Mr. Vavic helped recruit Mr. Wilson’s son to the water polo workforce.

“Choose Talwani’s ruling accurately rejects the prosecution’s declare that John Wilson’s donations had been bribes,” Mr. Wilson’s lawyer, Noel Francisco, mentioned in an announcement on Thursday. “Certainly, the prosecution can’t determine a single instance in all American authorized historical past the place the sufferer and beneficiary of a ‘bribe’ had been one and the identical.”