Former Chief of Learning and Talent Officer Devin Fletcher was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison and ordered to pay $593,492 in restitution for fabricating fraudulent invoices and purchase orders to funnel over $593,000 to a family member's shell company over four years.

Tulsa Public Schools — Senior Administrator Wire Fraud via Fictitious Consulting Invoices (2018–2022)

Outcome: Devin Fletcher, who served as Tulsa Public Schools' Chief of Learning and Talent Officer at an annual salary of $167,000, was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison and ordered to repay $593,492 for creating and submitting fabricated invoices and purchase orders over four years to divert district funds to a family member's company that performed no actual services.

Devin Fletcher, 40, held one of the most senior non-superintendent administrative positions in Tulsa Public Schools (TPS), overseeing learning and talent functions at an organization serving approximately 36,000 students. Beginning in 2018, Fletcher began constructing a fraud scheme that exploited his senior status to authorize payments that bypassed the normal scrutiny applied to outside vendors.

Fletcher enlisted the services of a business owned by a family member and created, altered, and fabricated fraudulent invoices and purchase orders purportedly documenting consulting services provided to TPS. The invoices were fraudulent: the family member's company never rendered the services billed. Over four years — 2018 through 2022 — Fletcher authorized more than $593,000 in payments to this entity. The scheme continued until 2022, when TPS noticed financial warning signs and launched an internal investigation that eventually involved the FBI.

Oklahoma State Auditor and Inspector Cindy Byrd's forensic audit, released in March 2023, documented widespread financial mismanagement and conflicts of interest at TPS from 2015 to 2023, confirming that the Fletcher scheme had been part of a broader culture of inadequate oversight. Fletcher pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud in October 2023 and was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison, three years of supervised release, and full restitution of $593,492.32.

The case demonstrates a persistent risk in large urban school districts: senior administrators with both the authority to approve vendor payments and personal connections to the vendors receiving those payments, with no system-level controls requiring independent review.

Primary Source: Devin Fletcher gets 30-month sentence in Tulsa schools fraud | Tulsa World