Spokane diploma mill officer sentenced to prison

A man described as the chief financial operator of a Spokane-based diploma mill has been sentenced to three years in federal prison.

Steven Karl Randock Sr. got the same sentence Tuesday that his wife, Dixie Ellen Randock, was given last month. Both pleaded guilty earlier to conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud, and charges of money laundering were dropped in exchange.

During six years, the Randocks and six others sold high school and college degrees from 121 fictitious online schools, as well as counterfeit diplomas and transcripts from 66 legitimate universities, government lawyers said. About 10,000 degrees were sold to more than 9,000 people.

Had they fought the charges and been convicted by a jury, the Randocks would have each faced more than seven years to nearly nine years in prison on the conspiracy charge alone.

Besides his prison term, Randock was sentenced to three years of court supervision and was ordered to forfeit his interest in more than $500,000 in seized cash and bank accounts, real property and a 2001 Jaguar XK8, U.S. Attorney James A. McDevitt said.

His wife has appealed her sentence.

Defense lawyer Peter S. Schweda asked in vain that Randock be sentenced to home detention because of health problems. Assistant U.S. Attorney George J.C. Jacobs countered that Randock, 69, would get adequate medical care in prison.

"It is clear to me that his culpability is certainly in the same category" of his wife, U.S. District Judge Lonny R. Suko said.

Under federal court rulings and sentencing guidelines, age and medical issues are irrelevant unless a defendant is shown to have an "extraordinary physical condition."

"There's no constitutional right to a particular kind of medical care" for federal felons, Suko said.

The judge said he was limited to a three-year sentence unless he rejected the written plea agreements.

Meanwhile, immigration officials have begun examining a list of 9,612 names to see how many federal employees may have bought phony high school or college degrees from the diploma mill.

The Spokesman-Review newspaper obtained the list and published the names on its Web site. The Justice Department has refused to release the list, which grew out of a lengthy investigation.

The list included some people who apparently work for government, educational institutions and the military, according to their e-mail addresses that ended in .gov, .edu or .mil, according to the newspaper.

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Information from: The Spokesman-Review, http://www.spokesmanreview.com