White House, NSA staffers bought fake diplomas from Spokane Web site

SPOKANE – A White House staff member and National Security Agency employees were among 6,000 people who bought bogus online college degrees from a diploma mill, a federal judge has been told.

Others who paid thousands of dollars for phony diplomas in the operation, which used names such as St. Regis University, James Monroe University and Robertstown University, include a senior State Department employee in Kuwait and a Department of Justice employee in Spokane, defense lawyer Peter S. Schweda said Wednesday.

None of the federal officials was identified during the status conference for five defendants in U.S. District Court, nor would lawyers for either side provide any of their names outside the courtroom, The Spokesman-Review reported today.

"We're not going to disclose who bought these degrees until after the trial is under way," U.S. Attorney James A. McDevitt told the newspaper.

Material provided to the defense by the Justice Department shows at least 135 government employees, also including some from the Department of Health and Human Services, bought college or university degrees to use in seeking promotions or pay raises, Schweda said.

The defense team also is seeking access to an Office of Personnel Management report which reportedly provides more detail on federal employees who are believed to have purchased the bogus degrees to enhance their portfolios.

The White House employee who reportedly bought a degree is the subject of a separate investigation, Schweda said.

The latest twist in the criminal case came Wednesday, a day after Kenneth Wade Pearson, 31, webmaster for the operation, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud and receipt of child pornography.

Pearson said he would provide evidence and testify against Dixie E. and Stephen K. Randock Sr. of Colbert, described by government investigators as the ringleaders, making him the third of eight defendants to reach plea agreements in the case.

Pearson, who likely faces three to five years in prison, remained free on a $10,000 bond he posted after being indicted in January. Judge Lonnie R. Suko postponed his sentencing until December 2007, two months after the Randocks and three others are scheduled to go on trial.

The Randocks also remain free on bail.

More than 10,000 sexually explicit images of children were found in four computers used by the Spokane-based operation, government lawyers said, but only Pearson was named in pornography charges.

The defendants are charged with conspiring to commit wire and mail fraud and laundering almost $2 million in diploma mill receipts in 2002-05.

As webmaster, Pearson set up and maintained as many as 125 Web sites for sales of fraudulent college and high school degrees worldwide, investigators wrote in court filings.

Investigators also have asserted that more than $43,000 in bribes were paid to three Liberian diplomats who also have not been identified, including one handoff that was videotaped by Secret Service agents at a hotel in Washington, D.C. Government lawyers have said diplomatic immunity precludes charges against the diplomats.

The Liberian "Board of Education" offered accreditation for the online diploma mills in exchange for the bribes, according to court filings.

About 40 percent of the estimated 6,000 phony college degrees that were sold with that accreditation went to foreign residents seeking entry into the United States, investigators wrote in court filings.

A task force of state and federal agents served search warrants in August 2005 after investigators found many of the phony degrees were sold in Saudi Arabia, raising national security concerns.