Susan Brown, a Marblehead resident and former executive director of the Boston Center for Adult Education (BCAE), was found guilty of embezzlement and forgery by a Suffolk County jury, District Attorney Kevin Hayden announced in a statement.
The charges stem from Brown’s connection to a scheme involving the embezzlement of roughly $1.3 million from the BCAE. Brown, along with Karen Kalfian, also of Marblehead, are co-defendants of Mark Mitchell, a former Saugus selectman who pleaded guilty to 18 counts of forgery, larceny, and other charges on Oct. 1.
Brown was convicted of one count of larceny over $1,200, one count of forgery, one count of forgery of a document, and one count of falsifying entry in corporate books. Brown, along with Kalfian and Mitchell, was indicted back in July 2019. She is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 9 in Suffolk Superior Court.
From 2009 to September 2018, Brown served as the executive director of the nonprofit. Assistant District Attorney Jodi Greenburg of Hayden’s Special Prosecutions Unit presented evidence showing that Brown forged tax forms and corporate documents with the IRS, ultimately losing the BCAE its tax-exempt status.
Evidence also showed that Kalfian was paid roughly $80,000 a year for seven years by Brown for marketing that Kalfian did not actually do, resulting in a $565,000 loss for the BCAE.
Kalfian was found not guilty after being charged with receiving stolen property. Mitchell, the BCAE’s former comptroller, was sentenced to 18 months in the House of Correction.
According to a statement from Hayden’s office, BCAE stopped classes and special programming for the first time since its inception in 1933 due to losses suffered from the scheme.
“It is extremely heartbreaking that an organization that has been around for so many years can no longer provide the important programs that defined it from the start,” Hayden said. “These individuals engineered illicit profits while the community suffered and had educational options ripped away from them. I applaud the Special Prosecutions Unit for their dedication to holding these defendants responsible for the harm they caused BCAE and the people it served.”