Terrie Brady and Ruby George were sentenced today after fleecing the Duval Teachers United organization of about $1.3 million each.<\/p>\n
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The women who ran Jacksonville\u2019s teachers union<\/a> for nearly a quarter-century are both headed to prison for cheating the union<\/a> out of $2.6 million, a federal judge ruled Feb. 9.<\/p>\n Terrie Brady<\/a> and Ruby George pleaded guilty in 2025 to \u201cselling back\u201d to Duval Teachers United<\/a> thousands of days more vacation time than they possessed from respective careers as president and executive vice president of a union with more than 5,000 members.<\/p>\n After an extended hearing where supporters recounted both women\u2019s histories of good works, Chief U.S. District Judge Marcia Morales Howard<\/a> sentenced 70-year-old Brady to 27 months of incarceration and George, who is 82 and was in a wheelchair, to a year and a day in prison followed by six months of home confinement.<\/p>\n Howard said she was \u201cfirmly convinced\u201d that nothing more lenient for either woman would serve justice and meet the standards spelled out in federal law.<\/p>\n \u201cIt does not erase all the other good things that Ms. Brady and Ms. George did,\u201d the judge said. \u201cBut there does have to be accountability for a decade of stealing.\u201d<\/p>\n Attorneys for both women asked for compassion, with Brady\u2019s counsel, Hank Coxe<\/a>, seeking 31 months of probation with 18 months of home detention for his client. Brady has already paid back $1,328,695 she received for non-existent vacation time. But she and George are both held responsible for repaying the full $2.6 million the union lost, so Coxe suggested Brady could pay $1,000 a month to chip away at the balance.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is not an overstatement to say that Terrie Brady devoted her life to the welfare of Duval County Public School (DCPS) teachers and employees,\u201d Coxe wrote in a sentencing memo<\/a> that called her sentencing for cheating DTU \u201ctragically sad and ironic.\u201d<\/p>\n The man who prosecuted Brady and George described no tragedy, just wrongdoing in his narrative of the crime, arguing the women \u201cstole at will \u2015 treating DTU\u2019s treasury like their own piggy bank.\u201d<\/p>\n Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Coolican quoted a Latin adage about corruption of the best being worst to argue that Brady needed to be put behind bars.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile holding positions of great influence and trust, despite having loving friends and families, and despite wanting for nothing, Teresa Brady and Ruby George stole,\u201d Coolican told Howard in his own sentencing memo<\/a>. \u201cThey stole for years. They stole millions. They covered it up and would not have stopped if they had not been caught. They need to be punished.\u201d<\/p>\n Charges against the pair were filed more than a year after a 2023 raid<\/a> of DTU’s San Marco offices by federal agents who carried off boxes of records and computers.<\/p>\n In his memo, Coolican referred to Brady as a \u201ccorrupt union boss\u201d and George as her \u201cchief lieutenant.\u201d Brady pleaded guilty in October 2025 to single counts of conspiracy, wire fraud<\/a>, mail fraud and money laundering<\/a>, the four charges detailed in a 14-count indictment<\/a> from December 2024.<\/p>\n George pleaded guilty<\/a> in August 2025 to conspiring to commit wire and mail fraud and single counts on aiding and abetting wire fraud and aiding and abetting mail fraud.<\/p>\n Those crimes carried potential sentences of up to 70 years behind bars for Brady and up to 60 years for George.<\/p>\n