Discussed ad nauseum the entire afternoon of May 13, luxe living while serving mandatory weekends in county lockup put the spending habits of former Beaumont ISD contract electrician Calvin Walker under a microscope – as the convicted fraudster has spent more on “chips and cookies” than he has on paying back the more than $1.1 million he stole from the school district’s coffers. Shocked onlookers were taken aback when the hearing ended with Walker ordered to serve 9-and-a-half years in prison for consistent failure to live up to the conditions of his probationary release. The same gallery was again surprised as the court took yet another turn in pronouncing judgment.
As part of the cited first amended motion to revoke probation filed Feb. 28, Jefferson County prosecutors were pushing for Criminal District Court Judge John Stevens to enforce court orders enacted when Walker was convicted in October 2019 of deceptively securing $1.17 million from Beaumont ISD. Following a jury trial ending in a finding of guilt, Walker was sentenced to serve 10 years in prison, probated for the full term of 10 years to community supervision, pay a fine of $10,000 and remit restitution of the defrauded $1.1 million. Walker was also ordered to up-front jail confinement for 180 days, which he was allowed to serve on successive weekends.
According to testimony presented during the May 13 hearing, Walker’s son – now working as an electrical contractor for a local school district – routinely provided his father with money, “to help him out,” which was then used to make purchases exceeding $8,000 while in jail for snacks, movies and entertainment, and phone calls. During the same time, Walker claimed he was unable to pay his court-ordered restitution due to limited income. More than five years after being ordered to pay back the money to Beaumont ISD’s students, the judge read into the record during the hearing, Walker has paid just $2,180 to the victims of his crime.
April 2023 through August 2024, the data details, Walker spent $5,082.83 just on commissary goods such as chips and cookies. For communication, March through July 2023, Walker put cash into the kiosk for movies and music at an estimated $800. Phone calls and messages, the county jailer read at the hearing from assembled data, from April 2022 through July 2023, cost the weekend inmate $2,210. None of those funds, witnesses testified, were unavailable for use in paying Walker’s debt, he just chose to not use the money that way, he said.
“That money was spent on bare necessities.
“No one can eat that food that they have up there (at the jail),” Walker said of his propensity for paying for extra snacks instead of paying restitution. He still denied buying excessive creature comforts, other than what was needed “to pass the weekend away.”
“The food is terrible and you couldn’t eat the food. I couldn’t eat the food…”
The judge was unmoved by claims of subpar sustenance at the county jail.
“You don’t go to jail for a good time and comfort,” Stevens said. “Nobody has died of malnutrition up there. It’s not a spa.
Notably, the court heard, Walker has also continuously been in the possession of non-exempt property that could be sold to satisfy the criminal debt. As provided by Walker to a federal bankruptcy court in December 2023, the debtor owned among his assets, property at 1520 Park St., valued at $78,000; property at MLK Dr., Lafitte Landing, valued at $92,000; property at Roland Road, valued at $357,096; property at 4445 Brandon, valued at $19,406; Langham Street property, valued at $2,034; as well as a GMC Sierra Denali, Jeep, Cadillac Escalade and bucket trucks valued in excess of a quarter-million dollars.
Walker’s probation officer testified that she instructed Walker to sell the property to pay restitution and ordered the able-bodied man to get a job. Walker declined to do either.
At the May 13 hearing, Stevens took matters into the court’s hands, ordering Walker to sign over unexempt property to the custody of Beaumont ISD to satisfy a portion of Walker’s debt.
“The court took action today that could have been done years ago,” Stevens said when talking about turning over the real estate and automobiles, balking at the 5-and-a-half years Walker has already had to pay the debt on his own accord. “The way it’s going, we’ll all be dead and gone before the plan of yours (to pay the debt) succeeds.”
Taking into consideration the numerous probation violations, flaunted fiscal withholdings and too much time passing without the defendant making any progress on … progress…, the judge determined that Walker has had enough chances to straighten up under community supervision – and, with noted reform absent, Stevens ordered Walker to serve his entire prison sentence, minus the 180 days previously served in county jail.
“You gotta figure it out, like we all do, how to pay for your obligations,” Stevens advised Walker. “At the end of the day, you were convicted of fraud. You’ve got to pick yourself out of the nosedive and figure it out.”
Walker’s attorney, Dick DeGuerin, asked the court to allow the defendant to remain free on bond while the team appeals the court’s decision of imprisonment.
“Justice delayed,” prosecutor Pat Knauth invoked in his argument of disagreement, asking the court to take Walker into custody immediately.
“I’m going to allow him to continue to be on the bond until this appeal …can be disposed of,” Stevens ruled. “I think, under these circumstances, that’s in the best interest of justice for both sides.”