BATON ROUGE— An East Baton Rouge School System employee is accused of working with an unnamed suspect to steal thousands of dollars of COVID relief money by filing applications from fake businesses.

According to documents from the U.S. Middle District Court of Louisiana, 38-year-old Kenyall Williams was one of many people recruited by an unnamed suspect to file the fake applications between November 2022 and April 2023. The suspect used Williams's name to open bank accounts for the fake businesses and filed documents with the Secretary of State's office to make the businesses appear legitimate.

The U.S. Treasury office issued a check of over $100,000 to a fake business named "Puckett U-Haul." The check was mailed from the phony business in Missouri to Williams' home in Baton Rouge.

The documents say once Williams deposited the check, she sent $65,000 back to her co-conspirator and used some of the remaining money to pay her rent and make personal purchases.

Williams was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and make unlawful monetary transactions. She will be arraigned July 30.