Millcreek schools to discuss Ian Roberts with feds as board votes to look into lawsuits Millcreek Township School Board voted 9-0 to have lawyers investigate suing ex-Superintendent Ian Roberts and search firm that recruited him to lead district. U.S. Attorney's Office also contacted.
Show Caption Hide Caption Millcreek School District considering suing ex-Superintendent Roberts The Millcreek Township School Board discussed legal action against former Superintendent Ian Roberts as Board President Gary Winschel explained why the board is upset with him.
The Millcreek Township School District is exploring legal action against its former superintendent, Ian Roberts.
Roberts is currently jailed in Iowa, facing a deportation order and federal gun charges.
The district may also sue Ray and Associates, the search firm hired to vet Roberts.
The Millcreek Township School District is opening up the possibility of more legal action against former Superintendent Ian Roberts.
As Roberts remains jailed in Iowa, facing a deportation order and federal gun charges, the Millcreek School Board unanimously voted at a special meeting on Oct. 6 to authorize its solicitors to explore suing Roberts as well as Ray and Associates, the national search firm the district hired to help recruit and vet Roberts, who headed the Millcreek district from August 2020 to June 2023.
The district has also contacted the U.S. Attorney's Office in Erie about investigating Roberts, whom the district believes falsified or fabricated his citizenship status on the federal I-9 form he submitted as part of the hiring process.
Employers use an I-9 to verify the identity and employment authorization of individuals hired for employment in the United States. Roberts is a native of Guyana, South America.
One of the school district's solicitors, Julia Herzing, said that the district has set up a meeting with the U.S. Attorney's Office for next week.
"We have reached out to the U.S. Attorney's Office to go over the documentation," Herzing told the board.
The U.S. Attorney's Office, which did not have a representative at the meeting, declined to comment.
The Millcreek School District is looking at suing Roberts and Ray and Associates for breach of contract and fraud-related claims, the school directors and their solicitors said.
"The Millcreek community as a whole has been betrayed, and we are infuriated at this deception," board President Gary Winschel said at the meeting. "Please know that we are actively working to identify how this deception was possible and to receive justice for our community through any means our solicitors find acceptable."
Roberts "weaved a web of deception," School Director Michael Kobylka said.
The district's solicitors will present a cost analysis of the possible litigation before the School Board votes on whether to sue, according to the vote.
Roberts awaiting deportation, gun prosecution
The Millcreek School Board's vote to explore legal action comes after Roberts was arrested on immigration charges on Sept. 26 in Iowa, where he was superintendent of the Des Moines Public Schools, and as court records and other information show that Roberts has been in the United States illegally since late 2020 and that he misrepresented his academic credentials.
Timeline: Ian Roberts went from Millcreek to Des Moines to prison. How educator's career collapsed
The district is exploring suing Ray and Associates, with offices in Minneapolis and Iowa, because it paid the firm $18,500 plus expenses to lead the search process that ended with the School Board hiring Roberts to lead the 6,500-student Millcreek School District.
The Millcreek School District has said Roberts received all required clearances, including an FBI background check, prior to being hired as superintendent.
“No disqualifying events were identified,” the district said in statement Sept. 29.
Roberts case already triggers lawsuit in Des Moines
If the Millcreek School Board eventually votes to sue, its action would follow that of the Des Moines School Board, which hired Roberts in 2023 to head the 30,000-student Des Moines Public Schools after he departed Millcreek with two years left on his five-year contract. Roberts' immigration arrest on Sept. 26 triggered a series of events that included his resignation from his $286,716-a-year job as Des Moines superintendent on Sept. 30.
The Des Moines School Board decided on Oct. 3 to file a lawsuit against its search firm, the Texas-based JG Consulting. The Des Moines district paid the firm $41,000 to find and vet superintendent candidates in the search process that ended with the hiring of Roberts, according to the Des Moines Register.
JG Consulting and Ray and Associates have not responded to emails from the Erie Times-News seeking comment.
Roberts’ legal woes have intensified since U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested him in the immigration case on Sept. 26. In a criminal complaint unsealed in federal court in Iowa on Oct. 2, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms charged Roberts with possessing four firearms as “an illegal alien.”
The ATF said Roberts, when he was arrested in the immigration case, had a handgun in his school district-owned vehicle and a handgun, a rifle and a shotgun at his house.
The criminal complaint includes immigration records that show Roberts is not a citizen of the United States and that an immigration judge in May 2024 ordered him removed from the country. Roberts lost an appeal in April 2025, clearing the way for his deportation.
The gun charge coincided with revelations about Roberts’ academic credentials. The Des Moines Register reported on Sept. 30 that Roberts does not have a doctoral degree in education from Morgan State University in Baltimore — an assertion that Roberts made on his application for the Millcreek job. The Register also has reported that Roberts was not awarded other academic honors or credentials that he claimed were his.
Crowd at board meeting upset at school directors over Roberts
The Millcreek school directors discussed the possible legal action before a crowd of about 20 upset residents, a number of whom addressed the board. Several of the speakers said the school directors were to blame and asked for a public apology.
Four of the current school directors were on the board when Roberts was hired: Gary and Shirley Winschel, John Dean and Michael Lindner, the board vice president.
"You didn't do your jobs," said one speaker, Tim Kuzma.
The school directors said they were as upset as the speakers, and the directors said they relied on Ray and Associates to review Roberts' academic credentials. School Director Shirley Winschel, who was on the board's search committee when Roberts was hired, stopped short of apologizing, but said Roberts had misled the board.
"I was duped by him," said Shirley Winschel, who is married to Gary Winschel.
Shirley Winschel said she and the other school directors trusted the findings of Ray and Associates when Roberts was hired. Winschel said she made what she thought "was the best decision at the time."
Contact Ed Palattella at epalattella@timesnews.com or 814-870-1813.
[SRC] https://www.goerie.com/story/news/local/2025/10/06/ian-roberts-saga-millcreek-school-board-contacts-feds-votes-to-explore-suits-erie-pa-des-moines-ia/86553795007/
