WOW - anyone else seen this story? Declined Prosecution of bush official

[The Straight Story]

Investigators sought former Head Start chief's prosecution

By Brian Friel, National Journal
[e-mail]
Federal investigators sought the prosecution of a former Bush administration official on allegations that she misused federal Head Start grant money, but the Justice Department declined prosecution, according to records obtained by National Journal through the Freedom of Information Act.

In a previously unreleased report, investigators said they had found evidence that Windy Hill, chief of Head Start at the Health and Human Services Department from January 2002 to May 2005, had improperly pocketed thousands of dollars when she was head of a local Head Start program in Texas. The report was provided to Hill's boss, Wade Horn, head of the Administration for Children and Families, for administrative action on April 1, 2005, nearly two months before Hill resigned on May 27.

Investigators with the HHS inspector general's office found evidence that Hill, as executive director of a Head Start agency in Bastrop, Texas, was reimbursed $2,400 for college classes in which she did not enroll, received bonuses worth thousands of dollars more than officially permitted, was improperly paid thousands of dollars for unused vacation time, cut checks to herself without supporting documentation, awarded contracts on a noncompetitive basis to family members and employed children younger than the legal working age of 14.

The U.S. attorney's office in Austin, Texas, and the District Attorney's office in Bastrop declined prosecution "due to a lack of resources and not meeting the minimum guidelines established by these offices," HHS investigators reported in the released records. That could mean the attorneys decided the case was not clear-cut enough or the dollar amounts involved not high enough to justify full-fledged prosecution.

http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=34775&dcn=todaysnews

[msongs]

1. steal a twinkie go to jail ? rip off $2000? no biggie

is that texas justice? or american justice speaking?

Msongs
www.msongs.com/2007politicalcalendars.htm

[eviltwin2525]

3. Yes. And yes.

[KeepItReal]

2. Seems like she was a bigwig at a Company that outsources Headstart

"Windy M. Hill was named the Associate Commissioner for Head Start Bureau, on January 7. 2002. The program is responsible for overseeing a budget of more than $6.5 billion in fiscal year 2002, and serves more than 900,000 low income, preschool children and families each year.

Prior to joining the Department, since 1993, Windy served as Executive Director of Cen-Tex Family Services, Inc., which administers nine Head Start centers in a four-county region of central Texas."

http://www.acf.hhs.gov/orgs/bios/whill.htm