Former South Bend housing agency director gets 9-year prison sentence for fraud scheme
SOUTH BEND — Tonya Robinson, director of the Housing Authority of South Bend for about five years, has been sentenced to nine years in prison and ordered to pay more than $3.2 million after being found guilty of defrauding the public housing agency that she led.
United States District Court Senior Judge Jon DeGuilio sentenced Robinson, now 61 years old, on May 16, according to a statement from the U.S. attorney's office that prosecuted her case. A jury in November found Robinson guilty of a conspiracy to commit bank fraud and to steal from the federal government, which funds public housing authorities, for overseeing a scheme to pay outside contractors for property repairs that never actually occurred.
Federal investigators found that four outside contractors would accept and deposit HASB payment checks, withdraw a portion in cash and hand-deliver the money to HASB employees like Robinson who were in on the kickback scheme. Robinson was found to have authorized hundreds of fraudulent documents to conceal the fraud.
"Ms. Robinson’s criminal scheme injured both federal taxpayers and South Bend Housing Authority tenants," U.S. Attorney Clifford Johnson said in a statement, "because federal monies that were intended to keep those housing units safe and habitable were not available for that purpose."
Four contractors who took part in the conspiracy have also received sentences:
In late February, Douglas Donley was sentenced to 27 months in prison and ordered to pay about $304,000 to victims of his offense.
Archie Robinson III (no relation to Tonya Robinson) was sentenced to six months in prison and made to pay $1,152,636 to victims of his offense.
Ronald Taylor Jr. was sentenced to 44 months, more than three and a half years, in prison and ordered to pay more than $1.7 million for his offense.
Tyreisha Robinson, Tonya Robinson's daughter, served no time in prison but was ordered to pay $363,122 in restitution to victims.
Albert Smith, the housing authority's asset director from 2016 to 2019, was found guilty alongside his boss. His sentencing hearing is set for 10 a.m. July 2, a representative of the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
South Bend's housing authority manages about 600 active public housing units, an amount that's fallen from more than 800 in recent years. Hundreds of units owned by the agency sit vacant because they're in such poor condition. Meanwhile, South Bend's poorest households face the city's worst housing shortage.
At Robinson's sentencing hearing last week, the ex-director apologized and took responsibility for the scandal during a teary statement, according to WNDU, The Tribune's reporting partner. Marsha Parham-Green, who assumed control of the agency this January, testified that she was left with a "very dysfunctional agency in disrepair."
Robinson will begin serving her sentence June 27.
Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter: @jordantsmith09
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: South Bend housing authority director sentenced to prison for fraud
