Quick Facts
Biography
Barbara Byrd–Bennett (born April 12, 1951) is a convicted felon whose career prior to her arrest was as an educator. Byrd–Bennett is the former Chief Executive officer of the Chicago Public Schools district and the Cleveland Municipal School District. Byrd–Bennett served as CEO of the Cleveland Municipal School District from 1998 to 2006(amid charges of inflated test scores for students and other scandals). From 2009 to 2011, she was the academic and accountability officer for the Detroit Public Schools system. She was hired as the Chicago Public Schools' chief education advisor in April 2012 and then named CEO by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel six months later. She resigned from CPS in 2015 amid a bribery investigation, which led to her pleading guilty to multiple charges.
Kickback scheme and federal criminal conviction
In 2012, federal agents began investigating Barbara Byrd-Bennett’s role in a $40 million textbook contract that was awarded while she worked in Detroit, long before she worked in Chicago.The Detroit deal was similar to the Chicago deal for which Byrd-Bennett was to be indicted in 2015; both deals involved companies that Byrd-Bennett had previously worked for.As of October, 2015, no charges have resulted from the Detroit investigation.
In April, 2015, Byrd-Bennett took a personal leave as Chicago Public Schools CEO during an investigation into a $20.5 million no-bid contract that had been awarded to SUPES Academy, a professional development organization she used to work with as a consultant. She resigned in June 2015.
In October, 2015, a federal grand jury in Illinois returned a 23-count indictment against Byrd-Bennett and conspirators Gary Solomon and Thomas Vranas.
On October 8, 2015, the U.S. Attorney handling the case announced that Byrd-Bennett would plead guilty to charges that she set up a kickback scheme in which she steered no-bid CPS contracts worth more than $23 million to her former employer, SUPES Academy, that would pay her 10 percent of that amount. Her former boss, the owner of SUPES, also promised Byrd-Bennett a job after she left her CPS post, trust accounts funded with $127,000 for each of her twin grandsons, and other perks. It was reported that the U.S. Attorney's office found incriminating evidence against Byrd-Bennett, including an email to the SUPES owner that said, "I have tuition to pay and casinos to visit". She had pushed parties aggressively to secure the corrupt deals.
Byrd-Bennett pleaded guilty on October 13, 2015, in federal court. In exchange for her cooperation prosecutors agreed to request a sentence of 7 1/2 years in prison, which is below the federal sentencing guidelines. She agreed to delay her sentencing until after the charges against her co-defendants were resolved.