In their case against the original Staples executive, John Wilson has now defeated national prosecution. The father of three children who were accepted into USC, Stanford, and Harvard as members of the water polo and sailing teams now turns his attention to Netflix for what he claims was a defamatory portrayal of the college admissions scandal in Operation Varsity Blues ( 2021 ).
Wilson, along with his brother Johnny Wilson, late sued Netflix, the film business and the film’s director and maker, in a Barnstable, Mass., better judge. They demand a jury test and court- ordered people apologies, corrections and economic problems.
Last month, the U. S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit vacated all the corruption, fraud and conspiracy views against two dads—Wilson and Gamal Abdelaziz—who were among 57 persons charged in the 2019 incident centering around college admissions. Prosecutors eventually dropped those reversed accusations.

Unlike many other plaintiffs, including celebrity kids Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman, Wilson was n’t accused of the outrageous misconduct that made the incident so renowned. He did n’t reward proctors to change standardized test results, fabricate false evidence that his children had learning disabilities, or create bogus photos of his boys playing sports. Wilson also made sure that elite schools did n’t pay their coaches to designate his children as athletic recruits. Wilson’s error was informing Rick Singer, whose base Wilson had given money to.
Netflix lists the picture under the classes” Documentary Films” and” Social &amp, Cultural Docs”. Operation Varsity Blues features serious reenactments of scenes derived from scenario records and other sources, as well as real-world images and discussions with critics. Roger Rignack, who is billed as second in the cast after Golden Globe-nominated actor Matthew Modine, who played disgraced admissions consultant Singer, was the actor who played Wilson.
Wilson’s attorneys, William Charles Tanenbaum and Howard Cooper, argue the defendants “vilified the Wilsons” by using “pernicious filmmaking techniques”. Wilson was grouped with parents who had been sentenced to prison or who had other misbegotten children.
This was especially problematic, Wilson argues, because Netflix labeling the film a “documentary” signals to viewers “what is to be presented is truthful”. Before the four-minute mark of the movie, the statement” the conversations in this film are real” appears to confirm this.
Netflix “blurred the lines” between Wilson and other parents, according to the complaint, by interlacing Wilson’s “edited words and images at least 26 times before and after” the movie depicts other parents “brazenly committing illegal acts”. Also problematic, Wilson maintains, his “name and voice” are superimposed “over a scene depicting other actors photoshopping fake photos of a non- athlete child”.

Because Johnny Wilson was a real Division I college athlete competing in water polo, who twice received the U.S. Olympic water polo team development program, and who received the 93rd percentile on his ACT, this editing is portrayed as particularly egregious. Additionally, John Wilson mentions that his twin daughters “achieved perfect and near-perfect ACT scores.”
Wilson further questions why Operation Varsity Blues would, as he tells it, go “out of its way” to have a commentator tell viewers Huffman’s daughter “would have gotten” into her preferred college without Singer’s scheme because of her academic record. The movie uses similarly obscene qualifiers for those involved in the scandal, but not for Wilson or his children.
Before the release of Operation Varsity Blues in 2021, Wilson’s attorneys wrote to Netflix and posed concerns about the pre-publication promotional material they had read about the movie. They specifically worried about the use of “interviews and narrative recreations” of FBI wiretapped conversations. Netflix pleaded with the attorneys to refrain from making “potentially defamatory suggestions of fact and innuendo.”
Wilson’s attorneys claim their client was a target of federal prosecutors because he lived in Massachusetts. Wilson was the “venue hook” for Boston’s prosecution to claim that they had jurisdiction over” all the Hollywood celebrities and dozens of other West Coast defendants in this high-profile case,” according to the attorneys.
Netflix did n’t respond to a request for comment, but its attorneys ( and those of the other defendants ) will answer the complaint in the coming weeks.
Expect Netflix to maintain that it legitimately relied on Wilson’s allegations, who was exonerated on appeal in 2023 and was found guilty by a jury in 2021. At the time the movie was released, Netflix could maintain that it had valid arguments against portraying Wilson negatively. Wilson might make an effort to refute that claim by referring to the film’s editing techniques.
Netflix might also assert that while Operation Varsity Blues qualifies as a “documentary film” under Netflix’s classification system, other movies in that category rely on dramatic devices to tell a story. That style of storytelling is arguably in line with the First Amendment’s right to free expression. For instance, Netflix’s The Devil on Trial ( 2023 ) falls under “documentary film” and features reenactments by actors, home video clips and interviews about the use of demonic possession as a defense in a murder trial.
Netflix might also inquire about the source of reputational damage. Netflix could claim that Wilson’s and his son’s reputation suffered primarily from his and his son’s arrest for a crime in a high-profile controversy.