A Prince George’s County woman who works for Charles County Public Schools is accused of using more than $100,000 of school funds to buy video games, computers and iPods for herself.
Theft and false statements charges have been filed against 40-year-old Rhayda Barnes-Thomas, of Accokeek, in federal court in Greenbelt. Prosecutors allege that she used the grant funding dollars to purchase about 200 technology products for herself, family and friends.
Barnes-Thomas has coordinated federal grants for the school district since 2006. According to charging documents, a school district audit uncovered unusual purchases of technology equipment with the federal funding, including Nintendo Wii consoles and games, Sony PlayStation 3 consoles, iPods, iPads and Macbook computers. Signatures of Barnes-Thomas’ supervisor approving the purchases had been forged, the documents say.
A phone number could not be located for Barnes-Thomas and no lawyer was listed for her in court records. A Charles County schools spokeswoman said Barnes-Thomas was suspended in December, when officials began looking into the allegations, and she was dismissed in February.
The probe into Barnes-Thomas began after two other then-school employees were charged with stealing laptops in December, according to court documents and school officials.
One of the stolen laptops was purchased with the federal funds Barnes-Thomas managed, starting a wider investigation into items purchased with those funds, schools spokeswoman Katie O’Malley Simpson said.
“Anytime something like this happens, you review your procedures,” she said. “But it was some of our procedures that led us to find this.”
The other employees, former La Plata High School teacher Scott Neuner and former Theodore Davis Middle School secretary Agnes Ford, are scheduled to face trial in Charles County court this month. Their cases are not related to Barnes-Thomas’, authorities said.
Law enforcement found several of the items when executing search warrants at Barnes-Thomas’ home and the home of a family member, according to court documents. She also allegedly gave other technology products as gifts.
In an interview with law enforcement officials in March, Barnes-Thomas admitted that some purchases — including a PlayStation 3, a Samsung television and a GPS device — were made with the school funds, but denied using the money for some of the other purchases, court records say. The records say she also created and gave to law enforcement a fraudulent receipt in an attempt to prove that she legitimately bought a television.
