EPISD Fraud Scheme Exposed: Five Former Employees Indicted for Roles in Massive Scandal
EL PASO, TX – In a shocking turn of events, a federal grand jury has indicted five current and former El Paso Independent School District (EPISD) employees for their alleged roles in a massive fraud scheme that defrauded the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) out of millions of dollars.
The indictment, unsealed today, charges 50-year-old former Associate Superintendent Damon Murphy, 52-year-old former Austin High School (AHS) Principal John Tanner, 51-year-old former AHS Assistant Principal Mark Phillip Tegmeyer, 53-year-old former AHS Assistant Principal Diane Thomas, and 48-year-old former AHS Assistant Principal Nancy Love with a range of crimes, including conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to commit mail fraud, and mail fraud.
According to the indictment, the scheme involved artificially inflating state and federal student accountability scores between February 2006 to September 2013. The defendants allegedly made false representations to the Texas Education Agency and the DOE, claiming that EPISD was meeting and exceeding Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) standards.
But it gets worse. The indictment alleges that Murphy gave high school principals, including Tanner, ‘marching orders’ to ‘put up barriers’ to prevent 9th-grade Limited English Proficiency (LEP) students and others who they perceived would perform poorly on the TAKS test from going on to the 10th grade. Later, Murphy and others implemented a plan using partial course credits for the 10th grade to reclassify and promote those held-back students to the 11th grade, thereby circumventing all mandated testing/accountability procedures.
The indictment also alleges that Tanner, assisted by Tegmeyer, directed an AHS administrator to change previously properly marked absences of students to make it appear as if the student were present on days designated by the State to measure attendance rates. Tanner’s action resulted in approximately 11,000 fraudulent entries regarding absences of AHS students.
The indictment further alleges that Tanner, Tegmeyer, Thomas, and Love conspired with each other to harm the personal and professional reputations of two EPISD teachers for providing truthful information to FBI agents. The alleged purposes of their scheme included the termination of both teachers’ EPISD employment as well as any future employment; and, coaching a former student into falsely pressing criminal charges against one of the instructors.
The indictment also charges Nancy Love with making a false statement during a Grand Jury proceeding on September 26, 2013. According to the indictment, Love told the grand jury that the former student sought her out for advice and help with pressing charges against the teacher, when in fact, it was Love who approached a relative of the former student to make contact and convince the student to press charges against the teacher.
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Key Facts
- State: Texas
- Category: Public Corruption|Fraud & Financial Crimes
- Source: DOJ Press Release â†â€â€
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