Wayne C. Parker Jr. Gets 5 Years for $9M School, Church Heist

Wayne C. Parker Jr., 57, of Mooresville, N.C., is going to federal prison for stealing nearly $9 million from a Huntersville parochial school and its affiliated church — a 14-year financial bloodletting that funded mansions, luxury cars, vacations, and Panthers season tickets while teachers took pay cuts. Today, U.S. District Judge Max O. Cogburn, Jr. sentenced Parker to 60 months behind bars, three years of supervised release, and ordered him to pay $6,606,463 in restitution — on top of the $3,000,000 he’s already coughed up.

Parker, once entrusted as both headmaster and church treasurer, exploited his dual roles from 2000 to August 2014, siphoning money through a web of deceit that included 29 fake bank accounts, 26 credit cards, seven loans, and nine shell LLCs. As headmaster of the church-founded school since 1996, Parker controlled its finances and used that power to line his pockets, prosecutors say. The thefts began early — including $100,000 funneled to finish building his family’s Mooresville home — and escalated into a full-scale financial strip-mining operation.

Court records detail a life of opulence built on stolen funds: multiple real estate purchases, a $1.2 million lakefront home in 2010, luxury vehicles, fine dining, boats, jet skis, gold and silver coins, and lavish gifts. To cover the cost of the lake house, Parker slashed all school employee salaries by 5%, falsely claiming economic hardship. Meanwhile, he lived large — with Panthers preferred seat licenses and globe-trotting vacations — all while pretending the school was financially sound.

But the fraud didn’t stop at self-enrichment. Parker also funneled stolen money to an unnamed co-conspirator, issuing unauthorized paychecks and covering personal bills like tuition, medical expenses, taxes, and car payments. The co-conspirator, whose identity remains sealed, received years of financial support directly from school and church coffers — all without approval or disclosure.

To keep the scam alive, Parker forged an audit report from a legitimate accounting firm, fabricating an unqualified opinion that falsely certified the school’s finances as healthy. The document, presented to the school’s governing board, was pure fiction — a paper shield protecting years of theft. It wasn’t until internal suspicions grew and an actual audit was demanded that the fraud collapsed.

“He betrayed the trust of an entire community,” said U.S. Attorney Jill Westmoreland Rose. The FBI’s Charlotte Division and Huntersville Police, led by Chief Cleveland L. Spruill, helped bring Parker down after a years-long investigation. For those who built the school and church in faith, the damage goes beyond dollars. But today, at least, there’s a sentence: 60 months in federal prison, and a bill for more than $6.6 million — if he ever has it to pay.