Former University of Southern California dean guilty for political bribery

• Marilyn Flynn, 83, was dean of USC’s School of Social Work from 1997 to 2018.
• She arranged for $100,000 to be illegally funneled on behalf of Mark Ridley-
• Thomas in 2018, when he was on the LA County Board of Supervisors.

A former University of Southern California dean pleaded guilty Monday in a bribery case involving a powerful Los Angeles politician who promised to help steer a multi-million dollar contract to the school if his son received a scholarship and a teaching job.

From 1997 to 2018, Marilyn Flynn, 83, was dean of USC’s School of Social Work. Flynn admitted in her plea agreement with federal prosecutors that she arranged for $100,000 to be illegally funnelled on behalf of Mark Ridley-Thomas in 2018, when he was a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

Last year, Flynn and Ridley-Thomas, who is now a member of the Los Angeles City Council, were charged in the public corruption case. Ridley-Thomas is scheduled to stand trial in November on fraud, bribery, and conspiracy charges. Last October, he pleaded not guilty just hours after his colleagues suspended him and the city controller cut off his pay.

According to federal prosecutors, Mark Ridley-Thomas offered to support a lucrative amendment to a county contract for USC’s School of Social Work, which had a multimillion-dollar budget deficit, in exchange for assisting his son, Sebastian Ridley-Thomas.

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Prosecutors claimed Flynn promised a full-tuition scholarship and a paid professorship, and devised a scheme to funnel $100,000 from campaign funds provided by Ridley-Thomas through the university to a non-profit run by his son.

Sebastian Ridley-Thomas was a state Assemblyman who resigned on the last day of 2017 after being accused of making an unwanted sexual advance on a Capitol staffer. The $100,000 was given to his organisation, the Policy, Research, and Practice Initiative.

He was later awarded a $26,000 scholarship for 2018 and was offered a paid teaching position with a $50,000 salary, despite the fact that being both a student and a teacher would violate school policy, according to authorities.

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