HARRIS COUNTY, Texas (KTRK) — Harris County’s former top public health executive faces new charges related to an alleged $40 million bidding scheme that allegedly directed taxpayer money to two different companies, it was announced Monday District Attorney Kim Ogg.
Barbie Robinson was charged with two first-degree felonies of fraudulently obtaining execution of documents in the amount of $300,000 or more. If convicted of either, she faces up to 99 years in prison or life in prison.
Robinson was also charged with tampering with a government record, a state prison felony punishable by up to two years in prison.
This is in addition to a third-degree felony charge of misuse of official information filed in November.
Harris County hired Robinson in 2021 from Sonoma County, California, where she helped create a social program to help integrate county services including mental health, medical care and housing. The program used software specifically designed to help officials help residents.
This same program was supposed to be introduced in Harris County, meaning any software vendor could bid on the project under Texas law.
But the prosecutor’s office says Robinson worked with IBM before the bidding process began, giving nonpublic information to its employees in 2021.
“By communicating this information to IBM early on, it gave them a decisive advantage over all other competitors,” Ogg previously told ABC13. “When taxpayers are treated like idiots by someone who circumvents a well-established procurement process, it can be criminal.”
According to court documents, Robinson was part of a five-member team that awarded the contract to IBM, although other vendors submitted bids for the same proposal for a significantly lower price, including one for $2 million instead of more than $30 million.
Once hired in Harris County, Robinson used COVID-19 recovery funds from the American Rescue Plan to pay IBM, the prosecutor alleges.
Robinson is also accused of helping to award an $8 million contract to an individual California company known as DEMA (Disaster Emergency Medical Assistance) Consulting. & Management to assist with the county program known as Holistic Assistance Response Teams (HART).
In that case, the owner of DEMA allegedly offered Robinson a legal job in California and offered her husband a consulting job.
Robinson was fired from Harris County Public Health in August after questions were raised in a Houston Chronicle report.
ABC13 reached out to Robinson’s attorney for comment, but so far has not received a response.
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