Chicago Sun-Times: Byrd-Bennett entitled to at least $140K in public pensions; cost CPS $900K

Chicago taxpayers paid almost $900,000 for three and a half years' work by disgraced former Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett.

And though she's a felon since pleading guilty in a contract rigging scheme at CPS, she still stands to cost taxpayers in districts that employed her more than $140,000 in annual public pensions.

Byrd-Bennett's decades-long education career effectively ended in Chicago in April after federal subpoenas looking into her and a $20.5 million no-bid deal she gave a former employer, The SUPES Academy, became public. She resigned June 1, was indicted in October and pleaded guilty to a single count of wire fraud within a week of being charged. She faces prison time and has vowed to cooperate in the ongoing investigation.