Lori Loughlin Just Scored A Major Courtroom Win

Lori Loughlin might be able to put the college admissions scandal behind her once and for all after her most recent win in court. Loughlin and her husband, Mossimo Giannulli – among dozens of other parents — face "charges of money laundering conspiracy, conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and honest services mail and wire fraud," per People. Additionally, they allegedly paid admissions consultant William "Rick" Singer $500,000 to get their daughters Olivia Jade and Isabella Rose into the University of Southern California as crew recruits. 

Loughlin and Giannulli have plead not guilty to all charges. They face up to "50 years each and millions of dollars in fines if found guilty," per Deadline.

In April 2020, defense attorneys for Loughlin and other defendants asked U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton to throw out the case entirely after submitting a memo that documents Singer's notes on the case. Star witness Singer — who wore a wire to cooperate with investigators to catch Loughlin and others — was reportedly told to "bend the truth" and "tell a fib" to "retrieve responses that are not accurate," per NBC News. 

His notes go on to say that federal investigators "fabricated evidence to create the false impression that Defendants knowingly paid bribes to corrupt insiders, rather than made legitimate donations to help their children's chances of admission."

To put it plainly, Lori Loughlin's defense attorneys are saying that Rick Singer's notes show that investigators fabricated evidence to make it look like the parents knew they were part of a scam instead of believing they were making legit donations to get their kids into college. The judge in the case seems to believe that there is some validity to the attorneys' claims. U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton wrote in three-page memorandum that the new evidence was "serious and disturbing," per NBC News.

"While government agents are permitted to coach cooperating witnesses during the course of an investigation, they are not permitted to suborn the commission of a crime," Gorton wrote in response to the allegations in the admission consultant's notes, per NBC News.

For now, the judge has asked prosecutors to respond to the allegations in the notes, but said that he wouldn't take the "drastic" action of actually throwing the case out, per Fox News. He also added that "counsel should have produced Singer's notes earlier," but that it was a mistake that was "neither willful nor prejudicial."  

Still, this is good news for Loughlin and the other defendants. 

The most recent move by the judge in the college admissions scandal trial tracks with everything Lori Loughlin and her husband, Mossimo Giunulli, have been saying all along. In 2019, a source told People that the couple felt they were "hoodwinked" by Rick Singer. 

"There's no other way to put it. She was convinced that she was making a donation, just like parents have been doing for years," the source said. "She did not have any intent to do something illegal, and in fact she thought she was doing the right thing." The source also claimed that Loughlin didn't stage the photos that "falsely depicted her daughters using crew equipment." The source went to far as to say that it seemed like "the prosecution is hell-bent on making examples out of people, and not playing fair."

Since Loughlin and her husband are also charged with conspiracy, it's vital that prosecutors prove that the couple knew they were committing a crime by giving Singer money. That being said, the new evidence shows that Loughlin's claims might actually have some merit. 

Since news of the college admissions scandal broke, Lori Loughlin has maintained her innocence, saying that she thought her payments were a legitimate donation and not a bribe to get her daughter, Olivia Jade, into college. A source previously told People that she was "actively involved" in building her defense, going over legal documents and evidence, and that she "feels like she's got a valid defense, and that when all the evidence comes out, that she won't be found guilty," a source told the outlet. "She still is looking into the avenues to defend herself against what she thinks is a meritless charge." 

Her hard work on her defense might be starting to pay off given this most recent development in her case. The new evidence seems to be almost like a lifeboat for Loughlin and her husband, who turned down a plea agreement because they didn't want to spend any time in jail. The couple, according to a People source, is confident that they have "such meticulous evidence" that they can still manage to avoid doing any time behind bars. 

All that to say, it looks like things might be starting to look up for the Full House star.

It's unclear how Lori Loughlin's daughters, Olivia Jade and Bella Giannulli, feel about her latest legal win, although sources claim to know how Olivia Jade reacted after the rowing photos were released. "It brought up all of her old feelings she had right after the scandal broke," a source told Us Weekly. "Olivia has Bella and her parents to lean on, but this has been a tough setback for Olivia."

What supposedly made the development worse for Olivia? The YouTube star supposedly had grand plans in the works, as the insider explained to the outlet, "Olivia really was feeling like her life was getting back on track before the quarantine and even a little after that. Olivia was going to go back to her parents' home with Bella and focus on filming content and getting back to her old digital life." They added, "After the photos came out, Olivia took a step back and even postponed some online collaborations with friends."

Despite these issues, another source told E! News that Olivia is "trying to move forward with her parents."