The "Varsity Blues" college admissions case rocked the legal world and higher education when it first broke in 2019. More than four years later, after 50 guilty pleas and a mixed record at the trial and appellate levels, the landmark prosecution leaves a complex legacy. "I think the government was floored when this happened," said Miranda Hooker, Complex Litigation & Dispute Resolution partner, to Law360. "It sort of forced them to pivot in a way they were not expecting whatsoever." The case was overwhelmingly successful for the government at the outset, but it also potentially created new avenues of defense for people engaged in "hub-and-spoke" conspiracies. "I think the government sort of became enamored with itself and protecting the integrity of college admissions in a way when they brought some of the other cases that didn't have anything to do with Singer," said Hooker. "That's where these prosecutions fell apart. They weren't the Singer case, and they didn't have the actual facts, much less the law."