Damon Murphy, a former high-ranking El Paso Independent School District administrator, pleaded guilty during a federal court hearing on Friday to one count of conspiracy to defraud the federal government for his role in the district’s past cheating scheme.
Murphyappeared before Senior U.S. District Judge David Briones at 10 a.m. for a rearraignment hearing to change the“not guilty” pleahe made in May. He said little during the hearing other than to answer Briones' questions with "yes, sir" or "yes, your honor" in a clear, firm voice.
"I hope this brings closure to the students and families and greater El Paso community, for what it's worth. I wish everyone well," Murphy, 50, told the El Paso Times in a brief interview after entering his plea.
The conspiracy charge carries a recommended sentence of up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine, restitution and supervised releasefor up to three years. Murphyis tentatively scheduled to be sentenced on April 4. Heremains out on bond.
Murphy's charges came after a five-year investigation by the FBI.
The two other charges Murphy originally faced — attempt and conspiracy to commit mail fraud, and frauds and swindles —will be dismissed as part of theplea agreement. Each charge carried a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.
Murphy is the fifth person to plead guilty inthe past district-wide cheating scheme, whichfalsely inflated standardized test scores anddeniedstudents a proper education.
At the time of the cheating, federal education officials focused on two metrics when grading Texas high schools. The first was the performance of sophomores on mandated standardized tests and the other was graduation rates.
Under the leadership of former Superintendent Lorenzo García, administratorscrafted an intricate scheme that raised graduation rates and kept students they thought would do poorly from taking the testbypushing them out of school, placing them in the wrong grade, incorrectly granting and denying them credits and wrongfully removing them from English as a Second Language programs.
Murphy was the associate superintendent in charge of struggling schools during a part of the cheating scheme. He had previously worked with García in Spring Branch, Texas, and was a middle school principal before he was hired to be associate superintendent in El Paso.
“Murphy’s career in Houston was in jeopardy and García knew Murphy would be grateful and loyal to García for the El Paso opportunity,” says the five-page factual basis included in the plea agreement. “Murphy stated he was hired to get EPISD out of federal and state ‘accountability jail,’ and was instructed that the best way to do so was to manipulate the sub-groups of at-risk students at the tenth grade level.”
Many of the allegations outlined in his plea agreement were first reported by the El Paso Times in 2012, including Murphy’s directive to place all foreign students in ninth grade regardless of how many credits they had earned elsewhere. At the end of ninth grade, the students were given their foreign credits and skipped to 11th grade so that they would graduate on time without taking the state test.
Murphy and other administrators also implemented a program to improperly re-test students in the English as a second language programafter the students had previously failed to meet criteria to exit the program, the plea agreement states. The “trick” allowed EPISD administrators to wrongly move students out of ESL in the middle of the school year,harming students who would’ve benefited from federally funded programs in the process, according to the agreement.
Murphybecame superintendent of the Canutillo Independent School District in 2010 but resigned in December 2012 after a district audit found evidence of similar efforts to manipulate student groups and data.
In exchange for his plea, federal officials agreed not to pursue any charges related to conduct he may have engaged in at Canutillo.
Murphywas arrested in April with four otheralleged co-conspiratorsin the EPISD scheme – former Austin High School Principal John Tanner and ex-Austin Assistant Principals Mark Tegmeyer, Nancy Love and Diane Thomas. Former EPISD Assistant Superintendent James Andersonturned himself ina week later.
Anderson and Tanner are mentioned multiple times in Murphy’s plea agreement. The document alleges Anderson taught Murphy about short credit recovery classes called “mini-mesters” that helped EPISD schools improperly boost graduation rates. It also says Murphy encouraged Anderson and Tanner to grant students credits that they had lost due to absences, and that Tanner ensured his teachers attended a training Murphy and Anderson held on re-testing ESL students.
At the time of his arrest, Murphy had already surrenderedhis educator's license andwaslivinginFlower Mound, Texas. He was working atan unspecified $60,000-a-year job in Dallas.Hepleaded not guilty, maintaining a position he first laid out in an October 2011 interview with the El Paso Times.
Back then, Murphy insisted that no laws were broken and administrators had done nothing wrong.
"There's nothing there. We are not Atlanta. El Paso is not Atlanta," Murphy said in 2011, referring to the discovery that about half of the elementary and middle schools in Atlanta cheated on state-mandated tests. "There is nocheating. There is no malfeasance."
He added, "I never said 'hey, move a bunch of kids out.' We didn't do that. They (the FBI) are trying to manufacture a situation that didn't occur. They really are, and it has all of our careers on the line."
Murphy reversed course on Friday, resting his hands on the court podium and looking ahead while answering Briones’ questions.
“How do you plead?” Briones asked.
“Guilty, your honor,” Murphy replied clearly.
Murphy’s guilty plea comes four-and-a-half years after Garcíapleaded guiltyto attempt and conspiracy to commit mail fraud for leading the cheating scheme and for steering a $450,000 no-bid contract to his mistress.
García was sentenced to 42 months in prison, three years supervised release and $180,000 in restitution. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons cut 11 months off his sentence for participating in a drug-counseling program, and he was released in late 2014.
Atrial for the five other former educatorswho were arrested last spring is scheduled to begin Feb. 13, though three of the defendants have requested the trial be delayed. Briones has scheduled a meeting to consider the request next week.
Anderson, Tanner and Tegmeyer arecharged with conspiracyto defraud the United States, attempt and conspiracy to commit mail fraud, and frauds and swindles. Anderson is also charged with lying to investigators, while Tanner and Tegmeyer are each facing an additionalcharge of retaliating against a witness or victim. Love and Thomas are both charged with retaliation, and Love is facing anothercharge oflying to a grand jury.
Former Priority Schools Division DirectorMyrna Gamboapleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United States and was sentenced to five years’ probation and a $5,000 fine in 2015.
Two other former directors in the division, Vanessa Foreman and Maria Flores,pleaded guiltyto conspiracy to defraud the United States in June. They are scheduled to be sentenced in March. Their plea agreements say they may be called to testify at the February trial or other court proceedings, as does Murphy's agreement.
Lindsey Anderson may be reached at 546-6345;landerson@elpasotimes.com; @l_m_anderson on Twitter.
