A former payroll director has been accused of stealing nearly $1.3 million from a District law firm that makes its bank suing the city over special education.
Tamika Beasley allegedly made false entries into the payroll records of James E. Brown and Associates to hide the cash she was skimming from bank accounts, according to court documents filed in the District’s federal court. She has been charged by information, a legal procedure that means she’s likely to plead guilty.
James E. Brown said in a statement to The Examiner that Beasley drew on the firm’s line of credit to inflate her pay in a “scheme that defied two in-depth [Internal Revenue Service] audits, annual bank inquiries, and the oversight of CPA auditors.”
The theft was finally uncovered through a routine examination of payroll records, Brown said.
“It will take me a lifetime and beyond to repay this money,” he said.
Beasley’s alleged theft caused 10 law firm employees to lose their jobs, among them her uncle, Brown said.
Calls to Beasley’s attorney were not immediately returned Wednesday.
The nearly $1.3 million was stolen between January 2003 and October 2008, about the same time period that Brown and Associates was raking in $15.5 million from the District’s coffers by suing the city over the special education system, city records show.
Brown is a former D.C. special education hearing officer. His firm represents many students who have fallen through the cracks of the District’s $300 million special education program. The firm has been the primary force in giving D.C. more special education due process claims than the rest of the country combined.
Earlier this year, D.C. Attorney General Peter Nickles sued Brown and Associates, saying the lawyers were wasting the city’s time and the taxpayers’ money.
The Examiner has reported how 10 D.C. special education students had been sent to the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Mass., where shock therapy was a mainstay. Nine of the students sent to the center, which was cited for neglecting the youth under its care, were Brown and Associates clients.
Brown said his firm has been forced to curtail many of the services it once provided to indigent clients as a result of the stolen cash.
“It’s a tragic situation for all the families impacted,” Nickles said. “The law firm has my sympathy and support as it tries to recover from the devastating breach of trust.”
