An Ohio mother is in jail after being convicted of tampering with records to enroll her children in a better school district.
Kelley Williams-Bolar, 40, of Akron, illegally registered her two daughters at her father's address in suburban Copley Township to get them into the Copley-Fairlawn school district rather than the urban Akron district, a jury decided.
The Akron City school district met only four of 26 standards on the latest Ohio Department of Education Report Card and had a 76% graduation rate. Copley-Fairlawn City Schools met 26 of 26 standards and had a 97.5% graduation rate.
Summit County Common Pleas Judge Patricia Cosgrove sentenced Williams-Bolar last week to five years in prison, but suspended all but 10 days. Williams-Bolar also must serve 80 hours of community service and will be on probation for three years.
The Rev. Lorenzo Glenn of Macedonia Baptist Church had asked the judge for leniency, saying he had known Williams-Bolar for more than 20 years, the Akron Beacon Journal newspaper reported.
"This is a serious matter," Glenn said, according to the paper, "but by all means, it was done to help her children."
Williams-Bolar told CNN affiliate WEWS-TV that she and her children considered her father's house one of their homes.
"My primary residence was both places. I stayed at both places," she said in an interview at the Summit County Jail.
Williams-Bolar's father, Edward Williams, told CNN affiliate WJW-TV that the children did live with him, so he believed the family was within the law.
He said his daughter's Akron neighborhood – where she lives in government-subsidized housing – isn't safe.
"She had 12 police reports that her house had been broken in, so what am I supposed to do? Just leave them there?" Williams said to WJW-TV. "I mean, I can protect them better if they was with me."
Williams-Bolar, a single mother, works as a teacher's aide at a high school in Akron and is just 12 credits away from earning a teaching degree at the University of Akron, according to the Beacon Journal.
Her felony conviction will bar her from being licensed to teach in Ohio.
Copley-Fairlawn Superintendent Brian Poe told WJW-TV the case cost the district $30,000 in two years of lost tuition and $6,000 it spent on the investigation.
He denied that Williams-Bolar was singled out because she is black and the Copley-Fairlawn district is 75% white.
The district almost always resolves residency cases without involving the courts, he told WJW-TV, but couldn't work out a resolution with Williams-Bolar.
"The way I look at it is, the bottom line, you need to follow the law," he said. "If you choose to step outside of the law, what's going to happen at that point is you are going to have to face the consequences for that."
Williams-Bolar told WEWS she intends to appeal her conviction.
Grand theft charges against her father resulted in a hung jury. No new trial date has been set.
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Where are the complaints from the parents of the school that has failed? This woman's plight should have been the cause for a local uprising of support for her, and demands that no one should have to break the law for the sake of their children's future. The entire case is an indictment of the inequality of the "American Dream". For most people, it is a nightmare, and the people who have brought this prosecution are the culprits for attempting to keep it this way. The people who should have been prosecuted are the one's who allowed a school to deteriorate to such an extent that some brave woman could do nothing other than break what is obviously a law which should be rescinded, until all education is equal in all schools in any given district or state.
How do you jail a Mother foir something so stupid?? I get a fine or some sort of community service but Jail?? For trying to get her kids into a better school. The US law system FKD UP!
It is not right nor is it fair that because a child lives in a certain area or school district they must go to the school in their area. The school my children go to always has headlice. There are always fights going on when the children are walking home from school. Is it so bad that we want our children to get a better education, or spend their 61/2 hours of school studies in a better surroundings? Just 4 blocks away from my home is a great school lincoln Elementary. yet my children have to go to Mckinley elementary because its just 2 blocks away from me. When lincoln focuses on the children that attend their 100% more than Mckinley does. I know alot of parents that lie and say their child lives at an address to whom actually belong to the childs grandparents, aunt, or uncle. For that their child does much better than they did at their previous school. I believe that the mother in this case was trying to do better for her children and not just settle for what has to be. You take a childs mother away from them, but punish her for taking a bad school from them. This society is not what it needs to be. Its not as tho she wasn't taking them to school.
personally I think the fact that they overturned the initially sentence is rediculous. this lady knew what she was doing was wrong and i her neigborhood really was as she says then perhaps she should have just moved her children to her fathers house instad of continuing to live in the "unsafe" nieghborhood. I actually know someone who has also done this and the only reason her children are enrolled in another school district is because it is more convienient for her and has nothing to do with better education or safety.
funny how we always have to throw the race card everytime. I'm sure it's only because she's black. I'm surprise the court ruling didn't just specify that fact. Honestly, the people who are most racially prayed upon are the white people. Ask any white person.
This is appauling! This is absoluetly ridiculous! What judge convicted this woman of this crime? The educators from this school system actually find this justifiable? Go mom! I would sit in jail for my ten days and take this all the way to the Supreme Court! This is America! Every student deserves a quality education....cased closed! Segregation is still alive and kicking..
@ Oh Boy....I hope you learn how to spell and I'll pray that you get some common sense since you think the only people racially preyed upon are white. Get your head out of the sand and go read some statistics!
The line of demarcation is - RICH vss POOR - and mostly always has been, it just becomes more clear as educational differences are more blended now.
You are funny.
And what white person do you know that has done the same and come out with a felony conviction and now barred from being a teacher all because they used another address to register their children?
I'm pretty white and it's clear to me and anyone with common sense this is based on race. Do you really think a white person would get a five year felony conviction for this?
Really, I'm half white half mexican and I find your statement absolutely hillarious. White people don't have any issues dealing with racism, other than dealing with their own.
You're a complete idiot. If you don't understand how difficult it is to be a minority in the United States than you are living in a hole. I'm not saying that Ms. Williams-Bolar is being singled out because she is black, but to say that white people are more "racially prayed upon" is insane. Firstly, you probably meant "preyed," but since your education comes from Glenn Beck I'm not surprised you got it wrong. Go and enjoy another evening of Fox News.
What they are doing to her is wrong no matter what color she is so I don't see the relevance in whatever point you were trying to make.
its the law .... 5 years.. there should be no time.. luckily states are going broke and have to stop this madness and release people from jail and fire over staffed police