Ex-admissions worker used student IDs to steal $84K in aid at TN college, feds say
A student’s missing refund check at a college in Tennessee led investigators to a 32-year-old employee in the admissions department who was siphoning off student loans for his own use, according to federal prosecutors.
Now he’s going to prison.
Renauld Clayton, who worked at Tennessee State University, was sentenced to more than two and a half years in prison after he pleaded guilty to wire fraud, identity theft and student loan fraud earlier this year, prosecutors said in a news release Monday. He was also ordered to pay $84,500 in restitution.
“(Clayton) admitted that during 2014-2015, while employed in the admissions office of TSU, he obtained the personal identifying information of TSU students and others and applied for student loans in their names,” the release states. “When the funds were received, Clayton diverted the money to his own use and others and deposited more than $60,000 of the funds to bank accounts that he controlled.”
A grand jury indicted Clayton, of Nashville, in May 2019, court filings show.
The allegations date to March 2015 when Clayton worked in the TSU admissions office and a student reported she was missing a $3,672 refund check, according to the indictment. The report sparked an internal investigation that led to Clayton.
Prosecutors said Clayton used students’ personal identifying information without their knowledge to apply for financial aid.
In some cases, he “obtained their personal identifiers claiming that he would obtain federal student loan funds for the students’ benefit,” the indictment states.
Clayton also changed students’ bank account information and diverted the funds to accounts he controlled, according to court filings.
He was arrested in Nashville in June 2019 on separate state charges of felony theft, criminal impersonation and criminal simulation after undercover detectives posing as bank employees caught Clayton attempting to withdraw funds using a counterfeit driver’s license and fake name, Metro Nashville Police Department said in a news release at the time.
Clayton pleaded guilty to three federal charges from the 12-count indictment in February, and his defense attorneys pushed for leniency in a sentencing request filed Aug. 11.
“Mr. Clayton got to the brink of trial before the consummation of the plea agreement, which in and of itself was a terrifying experience,” the sentencing request states. “Put another way, Clayton is ‘in the big leagues’ and he doesn’t want to be there. This experience has been harrowing and humbling for Clayton.”
His defense attorneys also said “this is not a situation where Mr. Clayton lived an opulent and lavish lifestyle on the backs of the hard earned life-savings of individuals that trusted him.”
Instead, they said Clayton used the student’s information “in order to apply for school and more importantly get a maximized refund check.”
