What to Know
- Dwaine Caraway resigned from city council after admitting to taking $450k in bribes, trips, gifts and other items related to DCS scandal.
- Caraway was sentenced to serve 56 months in prison and pay more than $500,000 in restitution.
- Caraway had 30 days to report to federal prison after his April 5 sentencing.
Former Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway began serving his 56-month sentence at a West Texas federal prison Tuesday.
Caraway was sentenced to serve 56 months in prison in April and ordered to pay more than $500,000 in restitution after pleading guilty to wire fraud conspiracy and tax evasion charges. He admitted accepting more than $400,000 in bribes and kickbacks from the owner of a school bus camera company who also pleaded guilty to federal charges in the scandal surrounding Dallas County Schools (DCS).
On Tuesday afternoon, NBC 5 Investigates confirmed Caraway surrendered to authorities at Federal Correctional Institution, Big Spring, a low-security men's prison about 280 miles west of Dallas City Hall not far from Midland-Odessa.
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A two-year-long NBC 5 Investigation first revealed that Caraway, the second most powerful politician at Dallas City Hall, had received so-called "consulting" payments and a home loan for his father from a man implicated in the DCS scandal. At the time, Caraway denied the money was in exchange for votes. But, he later admitted to federal prosecutors that he knew some of the money was to secure his influence on the city council which voted on an ordinance that allowed the school bus camera company to enter into a multimillion-dollar business deal at DCS.
That business arrangement later went bust, putting DCS on the brink on financial collapse. Dallas County voters elected to close the school busing agency in the wake of the corruption scandal.
At his sentencing in April, Caraway apologized to his former colleagues and told the court, "I stand before you today embarrassed and ashamed ... I let the poison in under the door and [it] got into my nose," Caraway said. "I look at all of you. I apologize to each and every one of you. I have let a lot of people down."
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