The sentence for Gordon Ernst is by far the toughest punishment handed down so far in the sprawling college admissions bribery scandal that shined a light on the lengths some rich parents will go to get their kids into the nation's most selective schools.
Ernst played hockey and tennis at Brown University in Providence before getting coaching jobs at Northwestern University and the University of Pennsylvania. He was offered the head men and women's tennis coach job at Georgetown in 2006 and was introduced by a friend two years later to admissions consultant Rick Singer, the mastermind of the bribery scheme, Ernst told the judge.
Defense attorneys asked the judge for a sentence of about a year, saying in court papers that Ernst, like the tragic Greek mythological figure Icarus, "flew too close to the sun and forgot his wings were made of wax." "Gordie has fallen from the White House to the tabloids -- a fall from grace far longer than the Court sees in a typical case," his lawyers wrote.
He was later hired by the University of Rhode Island, which claimed it wasn't told about the admissions rules violations. He resigned from that school shortly after his arrest.