The Broward School District plans to start conducting background checks for members of its voluntary advisory groups after learning that a member of one committee was found guilty of murder three decades ago when she was a teenager.<\/p>\n
But the background checks will be statewide only for most crimes and wouldn\u2019t have actually caught the Pennsylvania crime that raised concerns.<\/p>\n
The former district committee member, Deidre Ruth, a 47-year-old Hollywood mother, started serving in 2024 on the district\u2019s Parent Community Involvement Task Force, a group designed to help parents become more engaged. Ruth was appointed to the committee by former board member Brenda Fam and stayed on after Fam stepped down in the spring of 2025, when Gov. Ron DeSantis replaced Fam with Adam Cervera.<\/p>\n
But Cervera told the South Florida Sun Sentinel that he instructed Ruth to step down after learning that she had been found guilty of third-degree murder in 1997 in Philadelphia. She was 17 at the time of the crime and was 19 when she was found guilty. She was sentenced to 10 to 20 years in prison and was released in May 2007, according to a Pennsylvania criminal background check obtained by the Sun Sentinel.<\/p>\n
Ruth could not be reached, despite repeated attempts by phone last week and on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The revelation, which came to light through a story in the Daily Mail, a British publication, also has prompted the school district to take a closer look at who is serving on district committees.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter hearing concerns from School Board members and community members regarding the criminal history of a former advisory committee member, Superintendent Howard Hepburn informed the Board that the District will now require all advisory committee members to undergo a \u2026 background screening,\u201d district spokesman John Sullivan told the Sun Sentinel.<\/p>\n
Among the committees affected by the change are the district\u2019s Audit Committee, District Advisory Council, the ESE Advisory Council, the Facilities Task Force and the Technology Advisory Group.<\/p>\n
Cervera said he believes the school district should have reviewed Ruth\u2019s criminal history before allowing her to serve.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was not somebody that I appointed. This was a rollover from my predecessor,\u201d he told the Sun Sentinel. \u201cMy thoughts are this is something that should have been caught at some point by the district. We should have had this policy in place eons ago. It shouldn\u2019t have to come to fruition in a situation like that. This should have been on the books, and the district should have been vetting all of our volunteers.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the planned background checks would not have caught an out-of-state crime, district officials acknowledge. The district plans to conduct what\u2019s known as \u201cLevel 1\u201d background checks. These checks include a statewide criminal name-based check through the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, a check of the National Sex Offender Public Website and may include local law enforcement checks, district spokeswoman Keyla Concepcion said in an email.<\/p>\n
Hepburn had initially told the School Board at a May 19 meeting that the district had planned to conduct more thorough \u201cLevel 2\u201d background checks, which require fingerprinting and use an FBI database to identify crimes committed anywhere in the country.<\/p>\n
Hepburn mistakenly told the School Board these were the same background checks conducted for parents and community members who volunteer with kids on school campuses.<\/p>\n
But school district officials later realized that this background check system only includes statewide searches. The more thorough Level 2 checks are reserved for those who may have unsupervised access to students, such as employees, coaches and chaperones for overnight trips.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re keeping it the same as school volunteers,\u201d Sullivan told the Sun Sentinel. \u201cCommittee members do not have unsupervised access to students.\u201d<\/p>\n
The national background checks are more expensive, $41.25, compared to $2.50 for the statewide checks, Concepcion said.<\/p>\n
Sullivan said the district hadn\u2019t conducted background checks on districtwide committees in the past because they usually had less access to students than volunteers who work inside schools. But after revelations surfaced of Ruth\u2019s history, Hepburn decided to make the change.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the largest concerns for me is that we do have some of our committees actually visit our schools, and albeit they\u2019re escorted, they do have access to our schools, which means they have access to our students,\u201d Hepburn said at the May 19 meeting. \u201cSo I think it\u2019s important for the board to know the members that they may be appointing to their advisories or committees have gone through a \u2026 background check.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition to board appointments, most advisory groups have members who join in other ways, such as members representing the superintendent, the PTA or employee unions.<\/p>\n
Ruth has served on several district panels as a representative of former member Fam. In addition to the Parent Community Involvement Task Force, Ruth served as Fam\u2019s representative on a community interview panel for superintendent candidates in 2023, a process that resulted in hiring former Superintendent Peter Licata.<\/p>\n
Ruth has spoken often at School Board meetings to voice concerns about issues such as mandatory masks during the COVID-19 pandemic, sexually explicit passages in library books, proclamations supporting the LGBTQ community and comprehensive sex education.<\/p>\n
She also was highly critical of Rod Velez, a Hollywood father who was elected to the School Board in 2022 but was not allowed to serve due to his criminal past. Velez was convicted in 1995 of aggravated battery, a second-degree felony. The incident was a matter of self-defense, Velez had said, and he pleaded guilty to avoid jail time.<\/p>\n
A state clemency board never restored his right to hold office, and DeSantis replaced Velez<\/a> before he could be sworn in. Prior to DeSantis\u2019 decision, Ruth wrote on X, then known as Twitter, that Velez\u2019s background disqualified him from serving.<\/p>\n \u201cIf it was a non-violent crime, that would be one thing, but this is a violent charge,\u201d Ruth tweeted on Nov. 10, 2022. \u201cDoes Broward schools allow convicted felon teachers or school faculty with violent crimes? I highly doubt it. Rod should be no different than anyone else! He is a fraud!\u201d<\/p>\n