One father is an affluent Napa Valley wine magnate. One mother is the CEO of a Burlingame liquor distribution company. Some parents are Bay Area entrepreneurs, investors, business executives and developers.
The Bay Area residents share two obvious things in common: They’re all rich, and they’re accused of taking their desire to get their children into elite colleges to a criminal level.
On Tuesday, 13 parents from the Bay Area were among 50 people charged in a nationwide college-admissions cheating and bribery conspiracy that, according to federal prosecutors, featured Hollywood actresses and coaches at major universities, including the head of Stanford’s sailing team.
The parents are accused of paying tens of thousands of dollars — in some cases hundreds of thousands — to a bogus charity known as Key Worldwide Foundation.
The charity, in turn, allegedly facilitated a series of complex schemes, involving cheating on students’ college-entry exams and attaching students to college sports teams as a means to secure their admission to the school. None of the students, according to a criminal complaint unsealed Tuesday in what is known as Operation Varsity Blues, were legitimate athletes.
The Bay Area parents named in the complaint did not immediately return phone calls. They are charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest-services mail fraud in the larger criminal racketeering case.
They include San Francisco’s Agustin Huneeus Jr., the son of renowned Napa vintner Agustin Huneeus, whose family controls a global wine empire, including vineyards in North and South America along with multiple major brands.
Authorities said Huneeus paid a private college prep school director to help his daughter cheat on an SAT test. He’s also accused of bribing Donna Heinel, a senior administrator at the University of Southern California, to accept his daughter onto the school’s water polo team.
The FBI allegedly recorded Huneeus speaking on the phone with the operator of Key Worldwide Foundation, who has pleaded guilty in the case and was identified in the complaint as “Cooperating Witness 1.”
“You understand that (my daughter) is not worthy to be on that team,” Huneeus allegedly said before asking, “And is there a risk that this thing blows up in my face?”
The witness in September sent Heinel a fabricated athletic profile of Huneeus’ daughter, which included a photograph of another girl playing water polo, the FBI said.
Mill Valley resident William McGlashan Jr., a senior executive at a global private equity firm, participated in a similar exam cheating scheme and recruitment scheme for his son, according to the FBI.
McGlashan, the nephew of former Marin County Supervisor Charles McGlashan, who died of a sudden heart attack during a ski trip in 2011, is the founder of a San Francisco investment firm, TPG Growth, that manages more than $13 billion in assets, according to its website. He also co-founded The Rise Fund, along with U2 singer Bono.
He was on Vanity Fair’s 2018 New Establishment list, saying he “represents the new generation of leaders” with stakes in companies including Uber and Vice.
McGlashan was on the board of the private Marin Academy high school, in San Rafael, where two of his children attend, including a son who plays lacrosse. Two of Huneeus’ daughters are also students at Marin Academy, where they are listed as currently being on the water polo team.
McGlashan’s name and photograph were removed from the board of trustees’ page on the school’s website on Tuesday.
“After the charges were filed, Bill resigned from the MA Board of Trustees,” wrote Hervé Ernest, the spokesman for Marin Academy, in an email, adding that school administrators “were shocked” by the charges and concerned about the impact on the McGlashan and Huneeus children.
“There is no indication that anyone who works at MA was aware of or participated in the alleged illegal and highly unethical behavior detailed in the charges,” Ernest wrote in the statement. “In fact, the complaint indicates the parents who were charged made arrangements for their students to take the tests at a site other than MA.”
McGlashan was also removed from the rolls of the company he founded.
“As a result of the charges of personal misconduct against Bill McGlashan, we have placed Mr. McGlashan on indefinite administrative leave effective immediately,” a TPG spokesman said in a statement.
Ross residents Todd Blake, an entrepreneur and investor, and Diane Blake, an executive at a retail merchandising firm, are also accused of bribing Heinel to get their daughter admitted as a volleyball recruit.
“So very excited that my daughter … will be attending USC next year! #FightOn #trojanfamily,” Todd Blake wrote in a March 2018 Twitter post with a picture of a certificate of admissions to the university.
According to prosecutors, when the cooperating witness told Diane Blake that USC’s athletic records had been subpoenaed, she asked, “should I be concerned,” before saying, “I mean, (our daughter) doesn’t even know, you know?”
Marci Palatella of Hillsborough, the CEO of a liquor distribution company in Burlingame, allegedly shelled out money to help her son cheat on his college entrance exam, and paid Heinel for her son to be recruited to USC’s football team.
Palatella runs Preservation Distillery Bardstown in Kentucky, a craft producer of pot distilled bourbon. She is married to former San Francisco 49er Lou Palatella, according to a 2016 article in the Nelson County Gazette.
Commenters pilloried Palatella underneath a photo on her Facebook page of her sitting on an oak barrel and describing herself as one of the “real pioneers of post 1970s Kentucky Bourbon.”
Gregory Colburn, a radiation oncologist from Palo Alto, and his wife, Amy Colburn, were charged with paying to have someone take their son’s SAT test.
Elizabeth and Manuel Henriquez of Atherton were charged with cheating on their two daughters’ college entrance exams and conspiring to bribe Gordon Ernst, the head tennis coach at Georgetown, to designate the older daughter as a tennis recruit. Manuel Henriquez is CEO of Hercules Technology Growth Capital, based in Palo Alto.
The company has an enterprise value in excess of $2 billion, according to its website, and “is widely recognized as the largest non-bank source of venture lending financing in the market.”
The Henriquez pair surrendered to authorities on Tuesday, appeared in federal court and were released on $500,000 bond, each, according to the Southern District of New York.
Bruce and Davina Isackson of Hillsborough allegedly paid $250,000 worth of Facebook shares for their daughter to be admitted to UCLA. Bruce Isackson is president of a real estate development firm in Woodside.
Marjorie Klapper of Menlo Park, who co-owns a jewelry business, allegedly participated in an entrance-exam cheating scheme on behalf of her son.
Menlo Park resident Peter Jan Sartorio, the president of a San Mateo County organic frozen food company, paid to cheat on his daughter’s college entrance exam, according to the federal complaint.
Chronicle Staff Writer Lauren Hernández contributed to this report.
Evan Sernoffsky and Peter Fimrite are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com; pfimrite@sfchronicle.com
