Posted on 01/19/2011 4:24:57 AM PST by crescen7
AKRON, Ohio - A Summit County jury started deliberating around 11:30 Saturday morning in the case of a mother accused of stealing educations for her children from the Copley-Fairlawn school district.
At 7 p.m. Saturday, a decision was reached.
Kelly Williams-Bolar, 40, is charged with one count of grand theft and two counts of tampering with records. Her father, Edward Williams, 64, is also on trial for grand theft. Prosecutors said Mr. Williams took part in the deception against the district.
...Williams-Bolar, who was standing before the bench with her attorney, Kerry M. O'Brien, nearly collapsed into the arms of sheriff's deputies as she was led away, sobbing loudly, to begin serving her jail term.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsnet5.com ...
The update of this story is at: http://www.ohio.com/news/break_news/114148484.html but it's restricted from posting
They should have converted to Islam. She should have worn a burqa in court.
Her kids would have gotten lifetime scholarships and the prosecutor would have been slapped down with a charge of harassment.
I was sort'a hopin' for a smash n' grab or something.
It's a damned shame anyone in America would be prosecuted for the inalienable right to pursue happiness via a good aducation as opposed to accepting a mediocre, surely dumbed down 'public' education.
There's just too many rules, regulations, taxes and parameters in America for anyone to accomplish anything worthwhile.
May as well just be a good lil' worker bee and react to how high and to what color.
>>While her two girls were registered as living at an address with her father on Black Pond Drive in Copley Township within the school district, prosecutors said the children actually were living in Akron with their mother on Hartford Avenue in subsidized housing provided by the Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority.<<
So what does the dad get for his property taxes?
This system sucks.
I agree with the verdict. Stealing an education at a public school outside your district is . . . stealing. The district taxpayers support the schools, and the price of running a school goes up when more teachers are needed. There is no legal or moral difference between stealing the tuition of $800 per month per child for two children over the course of three years and stealing items of the same value from a store. If the kids were in fact living with the mother out of district and not with the grandfather, then the sentence was too lenient.
BTW, the correct answer is to fix the public schools nationwide; they need to focus on education and not on indoctrination. However that is in the long term. In the short term, if you want your kids to go to a particular school, you either move there or pay tuition - but do it legally.
So, we send parents who actually care about their kid’s education when, depressingly, so many don’t. And we’ll spend even more money to try them? And more money to incarcerate them?
There are real problems to be solved, and this ain’t one of them. The kid would be educated at taxpayer expense no matter which public school they attended.
Sorta introduces competition to the school place, the good schools get more ‘customers’ and the crummy schools get fewer.
We should take that further by vouchers, but if this is a step on the way there, I’m OK with it.
>>Stealing an education at a public school outside your district is . . . stealing.<<
The Dad lived in the district. He was the district taxpayer. He paid for those schools. What does he get out of it?
Sorry, I believe that the grandchildren had a right to go where their Grandfather was paying property taxes. There is no difference between this and gifting college tuition. If there was NO one in the district, then yes it’s stealing. As long as someone is paying those property taxes, it’s not.
And moreover, why isn’t the Copley district going after the Akron district for the money the mother paid to them?
Get the “Free” money Akron received for educating those two girls FIRST.
I hope that while the mom is in jail, she turns over custody of her girls to her dad.
Then they go to Copley schools anyway!!!!!
They were using her Dad's address. Her dad is a taxpayer in the district. If she had dotted the i's more carefully, they would have no case against her.
If you want to play that game then you should not have to pay school taxes unless you have a child attending school.
The grandfather was a tax payer and being that his grandchildren are immediate family, they should have the ability to go to school under his residence.
The only time this has been a problem in my area was when a high school football coach recruited a top player from another county, hired his dad as a janitor and created a bogus address for their residence.
Cool, a legal precedent.
I guess this means that Mexico and/or the illegal aliens owe us A LOT of money!
Like I said, she should have worn a burqa.
The “No Child Left Behind” Law includes a part where a student that attends a failing school (as defined by testing), can petition to attend another school in the district. Bush wanted to implement school choice, but settled for this. Unfortunately, no one seems aware of his rights under this law.
It’s actually quite simple. Obey the laws. It is stealing!! These touchy-feely situations should not elevate a criminal above the law.
There are millions of us paying taxes that are used to support the schools, and who do not have kids attending the schools. We get nothing out of it either. But it’s the law.
>>There are millions of us paying taxes that are used to support the schools, and who do not have kids attending the schools. We get nothing out of it either.<<
Big freakin’ whoop. Join the club.
My parents paid a Catholic School to educate us and paid their taxes.
I’ve owned a house since 1989 paying taxes.
My kids are homeschooled and I pay taxes + pay for their education.
If the Grandfather wants his property taxes to go towards the education of his granddaughters, good for him. He is there, he is paying and Lord knows, I hope the mother gives him custody so the girls can continue going to the school that their family pays for.
And when you take the attitude “oh woe is me” and “it’s the law”, nothing changes. Nice.
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