PACIFIC PALISADES — A Pacific Palisades man was sentenced to one year of home confinement and a $95,000 fine for bribery to facilitate his child’s acceptance to Georgetown University. 

Peter Dameris, 60, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services mail fraud back in June of 2020. On Monday, October, 5, Dameris received a sentence of three years of supervised release along with home confinement and the fine. 

Dameris is part of a case that has seen more than 20 parents sentenced for cheating their children’s ways into university, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office District of Massachusetts. He is the former CEO of technology services company ASGN Inc.

Dameris conducted the operation with the assistance of William “Rick” Singer, also from California, who founded and administered a non-profit cooperation called The Key Worldwide Foundation (KWF).

According to documents, Dameris agreed to pay an amount, ultimately totaling $300,000, to Singer’s charity “in or about 2015 or 2016.” 

Dameris knew, prosecutors said, “the money would be used to facilitate [his] son’s purported recruitment to Georgetown University as a tennis player, even though he did not play tennis competitively.”

Documents also say that Singer used the money to bribe Gordon Ernst, who up until January of 2018 was employed as the head coach men’s and women’s tennis at Georgetown.

Ernst facilitated Dameris’ son’s application process, and the child was granted admission by April 1, 2016, documents say. In or about 15 days later, Dameris directed the payment “from a donor-advised gift fund in his name to KWF,” prosecutors said.

Between or about September 11, 2015 and November 30, 2016, Singer caused KWF to issue multiple payments to Ernst via U.S. Mail.

Speaking via video to a federal court in Boston, Massachusetts, Dameris expressed regret for his involvement in the scheme, according to CBS News.

Dameris is the 23rd parent to be sentenced in the college admission scandal that has also implicated actresses Lori Loughlin (“Full House”) and Felicity Huffman (“Desperate Housewives”, “Transamerica”). Loughlin was sentenced to two months in prison on August 21 after a plea deal, while Huffman was sentenced to 14 days in prison on September 11.