With Beaufort schools audit coming up, another SC school employee admits to kickbacks

Berkeley County School District’s chief financial officer pleaded guilty to 20 federal charges involving embezzlement, money laundering and public corruption, according to a Tuesday news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of South Carolina.

Brantley Thomas, 61, was indicted by a federal grand jury in December and faces up to 300 years in prison.

A sentencing date has yet to be set, according to the release.

Thomas intentionally overpaid vendors and deposited refund checks into his personal account, converting about $450,000 of district money that he spent, among other things, on travel and private club memberships, according to the release. In admitting to taking 16 kickbacks from an insurance vendor for a total of $32,000, Thomas also pleaded guilty to 10 counts of public corruption.

Last January, Berkeley’s auditor issued the highest financial opinion to the Berkeley County school board. Less than a month later, Thomas was fired and the FBI launched an investigation. In March, the superintendent resigned.

The case of the clean audit serves as a cautionary tale for many serving on Beaufort County’s Board of Education.

Berkeley’s auditor told The Charleston Post and Courier that the problems caused by Brantley “just couldn’t be detected” and “there are limitations in any kind of internal control system.”

Beaufort County School District’s credit card spending underwent intense scrutiny by some citizens last summer, prompting changes in how the district reports its credit card transactions to include more detail than previously reported.

In September, the board voted 6-4 to hire an external auditor to review transactions from the most recent year.

At Tuesday night’s meeting, the board voted 7-3 to begin negotiations with a company — whose name was not publicly disclosed — to provide auditing services of the district’s credit cards.

Superintendent Jeff Moss has maintained that the district’s finances are sound, pointing to years of clean audits and strong internal controls that catch errors.

In December, the district’s auditor found “no weaknesses or deficiencies” in the district’s internal financial controls for the 2017 fiscal year.

This story was originally published January 16, 2018 at 6:17 PM with the headline "With Beaufort schools audit coming up, another SC school employee admits to kickbacks."