Federal authorities have charged a former Tomball Independent School District tax assessor-collector with wire fraud following an investigation that began in 2023.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has accused Kristi Williams of stealing nearly $1 million dollars from the school district and taxpayers. The case is still under investigation by the agency.
According to a letter from Tomball ISD to district families and staff, the district first investigated Williams in 2023 after it “identified suspicious financial activity”.
Williams began working for the district in 2018, but was immediately terminated in 2023 following the district’s investigation. The district then turned the investigation over to federal authorities.
Court records explain that Williams ran the Tomball ISD’s tax office, which collected local property taxes.
When local taxpayers used cash, a tax office employee would put the cash in an envelope and record the payment as part of a “batch” of payments in the office’s tax collection software, Spindlemedia.
After reaching between $15,000 to $20,000, an employee would close that batch of payments in the software. At this point, Williams was responsible for depositing the cash from the envelopes into the district’s bank accounts.
Williams’ indictment alleges that she stole $996,174 in cash and disguised the theft by reversing payments recorded in certain batches, recorded those payments in new batches, and kept the new batches open for long periods in the Spindlemedia software.
Since the discovery, the district reports that it is working to strengthen the internal controls and financial oversight to prevent a similar incident from happening in the future.
The district is seeking the restitution of the funds including “a claim against our surety bond that is required to be held for events of this nature.”
Williams is scheduled to have her first federal court appearance at 10 a.m. July 13 at the U.S. District Court in Houston.
