Ex-Fort Myers housing authority official receives 10 months in prison

FORT MYERS, Fla. An Army reservist and teacher who pleaded guilty to stealing more than $86,000 in federal funds was sentenced Monday to 10 months in prison.

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Twaski Jackson, a former Housing Authority of Fort Myers official, admitted to stealing $76,766.30 from the Housing Authority of Fort Myers, and $10,000 from the Lee County Housing Authority, according to court filings.

He spent the money on tuition payments, vacations and personal items between 2013 and 2016, investigators said. He’ll have to pay all of it back to the housing agencies, though he won’t be charged interest.

Jackson is in the U.S. Army reserves and teaches at Unity Charter School in Cape Coral. Friends and family members testified to his character Monday in court.

He broke down and cried when confronted with the allegations against him, according to Marcus Goodson, the executive director of the Housing Authority of Fort Myers, who said his story is a case of a good person making a mistake.

But Jackson abused the trust Goodson placed in him, Goodson said, and prosecutors argued that Jackson used his intelligence, likability and position to pull off the crime.

He’ll be forced to serve 100 hours of community service on top of his prison time. His maximum prison sentence on the pair of felony embezzlement charges was 10 years.

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