Between April 2012 and April 2017, McFarlane also was CEO of Celerity Global Development, a non-profit California corporation, which provided various management services to the Celerity charter schools in exchange for a percentage of the schools’ revenues.Īccording to her plea agreement, from July 2009 to April 2017, McFarlane and her co-conspirators caused the Celerity charter schools and Celerity Educational Group to falsely certify to federal, state and local authorities that they were complying with all rules and regulations governing the use of public funds that they received. McFarlane founded Celerity Educational Group in 2004 and served as its CEO until April 2015.

McFarlane is scheduled to make her initial appearance in United States District Court on January 7. The bulk of the misappropriated funds were used to purchase a building for another charter school in Ohio. McFarlane admitted in the plea agreement that she used the money to pay for personal expenses, including first-class air travel, fine dining and luxury goods.

In a plea agreement filed today in United States District Court, Vielka Maritza McFarlane, 56, of Sylmar, agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to misappropriate and embezzle public funds. LOS ANGELES – The founder and former chief executive officer of Celerity Educational Group, a Koreatown-based non-profit company that owned and operated charter schools, has agreed to plead guilty to a federal conspiracy charge for misappropriating approximately $2.5 million in public-education funds awarded to several Celerity charter schools.

Celerity used in a sentence