Federal officials charged the president of the FAMU FederalCredit Union and the director of Florida A&M University Institute on Urban Policy and Commerce with conspiring to embezzle HUD grant funds.
The three-count indictment charges Eugene Telfair and Robert Nixon with conspiracy, theft from an organization receiving federal funds, and embezzlement of funds intrusted to a federally-insured credit union. The indictment alleges that between 2005 and 2008, Telfair, the president of the FAMU Federal Credit Union (“FFCU”), and Nixon, the director of FAMU’s Institute on Urban Policy and Commerce (“the Institute”), conspired to steal approximately $134,253 in grant funds that had been awarded to FAMU in connection with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities program. The indictment states that Telfair and Nixon wrote one another checks from an FFCU account containing the grant funds and created fraudulent personal services contracts to make their taking of the funds appear legitimate. Telfair is also alleged to have created false tax documents, and to have changed the taxpayer identification number on the grant account from the number assigned to FAMU to the taxpayer id number assigned to his credit union.
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, and the Florida Department of Financial Services, Division of Insurance Fraud.
The FAMU Federal Credit Union is a member owned federally charted credit union and is not operated by the University.
Go Castell. she had a whiff of things not being right at the credit union.
ReplyDeleteBut she put Robert Nixon the Institute of Urban Policy and Commerce? Castell fan go sit down!
ReplyDeleteCastell practically tried to extort the Credit Union in order to get more money from it. She never accused it of any criminal wrongdoing.
ReplyDeleteFunny that Castell didn't get a whiff of her "$8 million surplus" being a $10 million deficit.
comPlease no that this does not mean they are guilty people. You guys love bad news and are always quick to throw people under the bus. This is just a charge. They are innocent until proven guilty, and I am sure their lawyers are already on it.
ReplyDeleteBoth are decent men and innocent until proven guilty. Keeping them both in our prayers
ReplyDeleteI wonder if Darryl Jones of Bethel's CDC is involved in this. Gainous did have a thought things weren't right with this institute and fired him. His old boss who was later sent to prison hired him back.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to Castell the SPT said in 2005.
At least 20 of the fired employees worked at FAMU's Institute for Urban Policy and Commerce, created by the Legislature to study and work on urban redevelopment issues.
Bryant fired all the employees of the institute in April, but refused publicly to say why. Later, she said the firings were related to payroll problems.
The Florida Department of Financial Services launched a criminal investigation of the institute earlier this year, officials said.
It is my understanding that Nixon Small runs the Business Development Center at FAMU are they one and the same?
http://www.sptimes.com/2005/07/01/State/41_fired_as_FAMU_scan.shtml
My beloved university is beloved.
Ammons must have known and kept quiet.
10:05 am,
ReplyDeleteQuit being messy by trying to tie someone else in this mess.
**** Your post ought to be flagged and removed***
Telfair and Nixon are good people. Innocent until proven guilty folks.
ReplyDeleteINNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY!!!
Gainous never fired Darryl Jones. His "old boss" never hired him back either. That in itself makes no sense. Dr. Gainous was the president. How can someone who reports to him override him as you suggest here? Obviously, clueless.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, all of the previous employees at the Institute that were dismissed from the university never worked with Rob Nixon who was orginally placed in the position of Director of the Institute. A job WAY above his head! He was brought in because Castell attempted to close the Institute which she was NOT authorized to do though she believed it! She set him up for failure. Period.
Ammons is a disappointment to my alma mater.
I cannot say one thing about Rob Nixon, good or bad. I've never worked directly with him. But I do know that Castell put him in an impossible situation. He wasn't qualified for the position of Director which is an Administrator's position and calls for a person with years of experience and a doctorate.
Gene Telfair is a good person. He's an honest man. He's an assest to both FAMU and Tallahassee as a whole. I HATE that this is happening to him.
Has anyone stopped to wonder why FAMU seems to go unscathed in all these mini-dramas? Is it the practice of the University to throw people under the bus to save themselves? No one can do business on behalf of the University or write checks for the University without authorization from higher-ups.
11:46 AM, have you conveniently forgot that Dr. James Ammons INHERITED when he became our president? You either have amnesia or suffering from dimentia. Let me refresh your bad memory; When Dr. Ammons arrived, 1. FAMU was on probation 2. FAMU had 35 (THIRTY FIVE, GOT DAMMIT!!) audit findings 3. Payroll was in a complete mess 4. There was ZERO student recruitment, 5. Our enrollment had DECREASED, 6. Our Law School was on the verge of being CLOSED, 7. Our Pharmacy Program was on probation.
ReplyDeleteEnter Dr. Ammons; 1. We are OFF of SACS & NCAA probation, 2. We received CLEAN audits by the State, 3. I haven't read in the paper lately about employees' payroll check being short, 4. The President's Recruitment Tour has increased our enrollment and is bringing in talented students, 5. Our enrollment is up, 6. Our Law School is FULLY ACCREDITED, 7. Our Pharmacy Program is FULLY ACCREDITED & has been appropriated $23 million dollars for expansion, 8. We received $8 million dollars from the State to open a Pharmacy Program in Crestview, FL.
So cut out this self hating, it must be bad cause it's black, coonery thinking. FAMU is not perfect, but we are in a WHOLE lot better shape since Dr. Ammons arrived.
I support Dr. Ammons & his leadership team and you need to get your "devil's advocate a$$" on board or hit the road jack.
many fools have followed a leader over a cliff. so let your a$$ go over the cliff, fool.
ReplyDelete1:01 PM, Fools and their leader don't know the difference between a cliff and a step stool. You're obviously one of those fools.
ReplyDeleteexactly, so it takes one to know one, fool.
ReplyDelete-don't let nobody fool you Ammons know exactly what is going on.
ReplyDelete-do you think he cares hell NO as long as it dosn't effect his pockets.
Ammons is probably the dumbest president famu has ever had.And you people keep prasing him for doing nothing. Ammons is all about a check.And definitly does not have any morals
ReplyDeleteNo, Ammons is not the dumbest president that FAMU has had; that honor goes to Fred Gainous. Regardless, Ammons is mediocre at best. His leadership skills are virtually nonexistent. The University currently operates on auto-pilot. Ammons might as well not be there. Most of the staff employees are not supervised or managed, everybody seems to be doing his/her own thing. There is so much waste, possible fraud, and administrative abuse at FAMU now that one shouldn't be suprised at all when the s... hits the fan, as it surely will. The reign of the overpaid incompetents at FAMU will end, just as swiftly and as thoroughly as it began. In fact, FAMU is now in the process of self-destructing.
ReplyDeleteTo all of you self hating MF who are hating on Dr. Ammons because he recognizes YOU are incompetent employees, do us all a favor and resign. I will take The State of Florida, SACS, NCAA, and other accrediting agencies words over yours ANYDAY. Your claims about Dr. Ammons & FAMU are baseless and rank right up there with the maggots.
ReplyDelete1:13PM--Everyone that has this type of knee-jerk defense of Ammons and FAMU is not serving FAMU well. I am very afraid that 11:01AM may be much closer to the truth than you are. Ammons is not on top of things--he demands that things work but offers no real leadership on how to get things to work. There is absolutely no coordination and unified functioning--it is every person for his or her self--the system (FAMU) be danged. This has worked up to a point mainly because of all the over-worked departmental staff and faculty. This can not continue for ever and the screwed up core functioning of the Administration is going to sink us all if some real leadership does not appear soon.
ReplyDelete6:05 PM, please define "real leadership". I thought "real leadership" was defined as "clean audits, no probation, infrastructure improvements, & great academic programs" just to name a few.
ReplyDeleteNow, please tell us what "real leadership" is in your opinion.
-let us discuss Ammons leadership everything you said for the outside to see and when you open the can eveyrthing is rotten, spoiled,and very superficial for the world to see.
ReplyDelete-he tells you what you want to here and have plan B.
-don't go by what you see go by what you don't see.
4:16 PM, go play with yourself.
ReplyDeleteHow did grant funds awarded to FAMU get placed into a external bank account? I thought the university fronts the money and then presents a bill to the agency for the costs incurred. Does anyone know what was going on? By the way Nixon reports to Fuse-Hall under Ammons.
ReplyDeletego play with yourself ...????
ReplyDelete@ 07/12, 10:34 - This is what FAMU has been doing for years! This is what happened with the NSF grant and the IUPC. The grant money came into the University as it should have. FAMU doesn't want to actually oversee the management of the funds so they either send it somewhere else to be managed or allow people who have no idea what they are doing to manage the funds and write checks. Then when they are "discovered" by the agencies, they throw anyone else under the bus to take the fall for them.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there are other people reading this that know the truth!
And this is not about "self-hate" as some other clueless individuals have suggested. I love my alma mater but I live by what my mama always drilled into us... "I will love you until forever, but I won't uphold you in ANY wrongdoing!"
These are peoples' LIVES being destroyed because the administration continues to try to cover their own behinds.
With all of the signatures and approvals needed to get FAMU to write a check how can the administration claim no responsibility? Someone in authority needs to understand what these funds are for and how they are being managed. Nixon is not a faculty member how does he get to be PI on an award or director of an Institute? Isn't this why faculty have tenure to insure that they will have less incentive to participate in this type of graft?
ReplyDeleteMaybe the HUD award was made to the FCU and the FAMU Urban institute was some kind of subcontractor. In any case this is a mess but it is not unusual at an University which supports these types of programs.