Former executive director Blake Bowman pleaded guilty to misusing Camp Thurman funds in 2021 and 2022.<\/p>\n
Bowman, who oversaw the Christian camp in Pantego for eight years, was arrested in 2024 and charged with misapplication of property as a fiduciary and theft of property, each valued at $300,000 or more.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors showed transactions totaling more than $1 million, according to court filings. It is unclear how much they allege Bowman stole or misapplied.<\/p>\n
Bowman entered an open plea in late February, meaning he pleaded guilty to both first-degree felony counts. His sentencing will be decided by the court at a later date.<\/p>\n
A conviction on each charge could carry a punishment<\/a> of five to 99 years in prison, along with fines.<\/p>\n Bowman\u2019s lawyer declined to comment. The Tarrant County district attorney\u2019s office declined to comment because the case is pending.<\/p>\n Court filings show Bowman was accused of using credit cards intended for camp expenses to pay personal expenses and connecting his PayPal account to Camp Thurman\u2019s bank account.<\/p>\n State officials also found evidence from Camp Thurman and OnlyFans, an adult-subscription service, according to a February 2025 court filing.<\/p>\n In a June 27 filing, officials from the district attorney\u2019s office said they learned during a witness meeting with camp leadership that Bowman made payments to the camp amounting to about $2,800 between March 2024 and May 2025. The filings did not disclose what the payments were for.<\/p>\n Bowman was indicted in April 2024 and arrested about a month later. He posted bail but then was reindicted in January 2025 after new information about the embezzlement allegations surfaced.<\/p>\n Bowman took a job in Weatherford ISD as a fourth-grade teacher in late 2022, where he worked until May 2023, district officials confirmed.<\/p>\n Later that year, he taught in Burleson ISD. Bowman resigned Aug. 21, 2025, Burleson ISD spokesperson Katelyn Tyler previously told the Arlington Report.<\/p>\n Bowman\u2019s teacher certification<\/a> is under review, Texas Education Agency confirmed, adding that they could not comment further as the investigation is active.<\/p>\n Chris Moss is a reporting fellow for the Arlington Report. Contact him at chris.moss@fortworthreport.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n Editor\u2019s note: This story was originally published Aug. 20, 2025. It has been updated Aug. 22, 2025, Sept. 19, 2025, and March 17, 2026, with new information.\u00a0<\/p>\n At the Arlington Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here<\/a>.<\/p>\n This article<\/a> first appeared on Arlington Report<\/a> and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former executive director Blake Bowman pleaded guilty to misusing Camp Thurman funds in 2021 and 2022. Bowman, who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[150,152,151],"class_list":["post-208944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arlington","tag-arlington","tag-arlington-headlines","tag-arlington-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}