Last update to this piece https://www.republicreport.org/2019/devos-fiddles-schools-burn/
Magistrate Judge Parker held a previously scheduled hearing Friday, in advance of Monday’s bigger court showdown. According to a press release from the National Student Legal Defense Network, which represents a group of students who were misled by DCEH about its lack of accreditation, at the hearing receiver Mark Dottore “was still unable to account for the whereabouts of the $13 million that Argosy students have yet to be paid.” In addition, “The court was also unable to learn more from the Department of Education, because Dottore failed to invite it to attend, despite being ordered to do so.” Judge Parker had issued an order February 28 that directed Dottore “to invite a representative of the Department of Education with knowledge of how student stipends might be paid to participate in the March 8, 2019 status conference either in person or by telephone.” When no one appeared in court Friday to represent the Department, Parker asked Dottore’s counsel if the receiver had alerted the Department as ordered. Counsel replied, “yes, with an explanation,” and then stated that the Department has access to the court’s PACER online filing system, so it must have known.
Dottore, through his lawyers Mary Whitmer and Robert Glickman, also told the court Friday that the receiver first learned of DCEH’s alleged bookkeeping fraud on February 20 from two DCEH employees, whom the lawyers declined to name. This would have been a full two weeks before Dottore disclosed the scheme in his First Receiver Report, dated March 4.
Shortly after the hearing, Judge Parker issued an order, requiring “the DCEH employee(s) with knowledge” of the alleged accounting scheme to appear at Monday’s hearing, as well as a representative of the Department of Education with knowledge of the matter.
A few hours later, Dottore filed his response to the Department of Education’s February 27 letter cutting off federal student aid to Argosy. Read it. Among other things, Dottore charges: that the Department “had adopted a cold … outright antagonistic, approach” to him; that he did not know about alleged financial misrepresentations made by DCEH before the receivership was created; that he was party to pre-receivership discussions about a potential deal with Eastern Gateway Community College but he did not know about the Colbeck/Studio deal until after it was executed; that the Studio deal was crafted by Studio, DCEH’s lenders, and the Department without DCEH’s involvement until DCEH was told to take the deal or lose access to federal aid; that his firing of 1,700 Argosy employees did not, as alleged, include dragging professors out of classrooms or otherwise cutting full teaching positions; that the chancellor of Argosy, Cynthia Baum, asked seven times to be fired, ultimately stating “Just [expletive] terminate me!” until Dottore finally did so; and that “the failure of the Argosy system was pre-determined before I was appointed Receiver.”