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Arizona: Charter School Principal Pleads Guilty to Fraud

The principal of the Discovery Creemos Charter School pled guilty to inflating enrollment and stealing $2.5 million from the state and federal governments. 

The former principal of the shuttered Discovery Creemos Academy pleaded guilty Friday to participating in a $2.5 million scheme to inflate enrollment at the defunct charter school.

Harold Cadiz, 55, faces up to 12 ½ years in prison after pleading guilty in Maricopa County Superior Court to two counts of felony theft during the 2016-17 and 2017-18 school years. He’s scheduled to be sentenced March 27.

Cadiz is the second administrator from the Goodyear charter school, also known as the Bradley Academy of Excellence, to admit to participating in the scheme to defraud the state and federal governments by inflating the school’s enrollment by hundreds of students.

Cadiz’s plea calls for a prison sentence of 3 to 12 ½ years and up to 7 years of probation.

Arizona public schools are funded based on the number of students, meaning each additional student a school reports to the state brings more tax dollars.

Daniel K. Hughes, president and CEO of Discovery Creemos, was the first executive at the school to cut a plea bargain with the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, admitting to theft and conspiracy in November 2018. He faces a presumptive prison sentence of five years.

The school closed January 2018, just after the 100th day of the school year, ensuring it would receive as much state money as possible before it closed.

A few months before Discovery Creemos Academy closed, Hughes had assured the Charter Board that he would turn around the financially and academically failing charter school. Reviews by the Charter Board for the 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16 school years found the school did not meet its financial performance recommendations.

Hughes has admitted that during the 2017-18 school year, his school reported an enrollment of 528 students, but 453 of them were fraudulent. In 2016-17, the school reported it had 652 students, but 191 were fraudulent.

 

 



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