$500B? Proposed Class Action Seeks Windfall in College Admissions Scandal
A proposed nationwide class action filed in California state court seeks "no less than $500,000,000,000" from defendants caught up in the college admissions scandal that has captured the nation's attention.
March 14, 2019 at 04:47 PM
2 minute read
The original version of this story was published on The Recorder
A proposed nationwide class action filed in California state court seeks “no less than $500,000,000,000″ from defendants caught up in the college admissions scandal that has captured the nation's attention.
Los Angeles lawyer Daniel King filed a complaint in San Francisco Superior Court Wednesday on behalf of former teacher Jennifer Kay Toy and her son Joshua against prominent individuals indicted earlier in the week, including actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin, and lesser-known prosecution targets, including Elisabeth Kimmel, the longtime president of San Diego-based Midwest Television. The lawsuit, however, does not name universities that have been embroiled in the episode as defendants.
According to the complaint, Joshua Toy was not accepted to some colleges where he applied despite his 4.2 high school grade point average. The complaint, however, does not specify which schools denied him acceptance.
“Joshua and I believed that he'd had a fair chance just like all other applicants but did not make the cut for some undisclosed reason,” the mother wrote in the introduction to the complaint. “I'm now aware of the massive cheating scandal wherein wealthy people conspired with people in positions of power and authority in order to allow their children to the very colleges that Joshua was rejected from.”
Toy wrote that she was “outraged and hurt” that her only son was denied access “because wealthy individuals felt that it was OK to lie, cheat, steal and bribe their children's way into a good college.”
The lawsuit seeks to certify a class of “all persons in the United States … whose rights to a fair chance at entrance to college was stolen by the actions of the defendants.” The suit brings claims of negligent infliction of emotional distress, civil conspiracy and fraud against all defendants.
King, the Toys' lawyer, didn't immediately respond to phone and email messages Thursday afternoon.
Read the complaint:
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