Lori Loughlin released after serving jail term for university bribes scam

Loughlin’s fashion designer husband Mossimo Giannulli, who was also jailed, is scheduled to be released on April 17.

Lori Loughlin has been released from prison (AP/Steven Senne, File)

By Alanna Durkin Richer, Associated Press

December 28 2020 02:40 PM

Full House actor Lori Loughlin has been released from prison after spending two months behind bars for paying bribes to get her two daughters into university.

Loughlin was released from the federal prison in Dublin, California, where she had been serving her sentence for her role in the bribery scheme, the federal Bureau of Prisons said. Her husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, is serving his five-month sentence at a prison in Lompoc near Santa Barbara, California.

Loughlin and Giannulli were both initially supposed to report to prison on November 19, but prosecutors and defence lawyers agreed Loughlin could start her sentence on October 30. Loughlin also agreed that she would not seek early release on coronavirus-related grounds, prosecutors said.

Giannulli is scheduled to be released on April 17, the Bureau of Prisons says.

Lori Loughlin leaving court in August 2019 (AP/Philip Marcelo, File)

Loughlin and Giannulli were among the highest-profile defendants charged in the scheme, which revealed the lengths to which some wealthy parents will go to get their children into elite universities.

The famous couple admitted in May to paying 500,000 dollars to get their two daughters into the University of Southern California as crew recruits even though neither girl was a rower. Their guilty plea was a stunning reversal for the couple, whose lawyers had insisted for a year that they were innocent and accused investigators of fabricating evidence against them.

The only public comments either Loughlin or Giannulli made about the case since their arrest last year came at their sentencing hearings in August. Loughlin told the judge her actions “helped exacerbate existing inequalities in society” and pledged to do everything in her power to use her experience as a “catalyst to do good”.

Their younger daughter, social media influencer Olivia Jade, made her first public remarks about the scandal this month on the series Red Table Talk. Olivia Jade said she does not want or deserve pity.

“We messed up. I just want a second chance to be like, ‘I recognise I messed up.’ And for so long I wasn’t able to talk about this because of the legalities behind it,” she said.

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Of the nearly 60 parents, coaches and others charged in the case, about a dozen are still fighting the allegations. The sentences for the parents who have pleaded so far in the case range from a couple of weeks to nine months.