A DeSoto Independent School District employee pleaded guilty today to embezzling more than $250,000 from the district, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Chad E. Meacham.
Terry Lynn Sanders, the 57-year-old former DeSoto ISD Director of Energy Management, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
In plea papers, Mr. Sanders admitted he used a school district credit card to make 30 payments worth $255,100 to an outside company. The owner of the company, identified in court documents as “individual A,” then kicked back a portion of each payment, totaling approximately $100,000, to Mr. Sanders.
Mr. Sanders admitted that neither individual A nor his company performed any work for the school district, nor was the company an approved vendor with a contract with the district.
He also admitted that in order to test oversight of the card, he used the card to make seven payments worth $17,466 to pay a fictitious vendor tied to his own bank account.
Mr. Sanders now faces up to five years in federal prison.
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The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Dallas Field Office conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Marcus Busch is prosecuting the case.