Tanya McDowell, a homeless Connecticut woman, is headed to court to face criminal charges because she used a friend’s address to send her child to a better school.
Connecticut prosecutors have charged McDowell with grand larceny and conspiracy to commit grand larceny for enrolling her six-year-old son in a school district in which she did not live. Â Prosecutors have estimated the value of the child’s four-month stay at the school at over $15,000.
McDowell told authorities she had been splitting time between living in a van, a shelter in Norwalk, Conn. and a friend’s house in Bridgeport. Â Prosecutors assert since she did not register at the Norwalk shelter, her child was ineligible to attend school in the Norwalk district and should have attended class in a lower-achieving Bridgeport school. Â
The case has set national shockwaves as McDowell’s supporters claim the woman should not be arrested for trying to get her child a better education.
“Do we really want to be punitive for this?” said Gwen Samuel, founder of the Connecticut Parents Union, to FoxNews.com “We just cannot be the state that is stooping to this level.”
Court hearings are scheduled for Wednesday. Â McDowell, has previously been in trouble with the law and faces a maximum of 20 years in prison if convicted.
