Billy Porter was honorary grand marshall of the 2024 Dallas Pride parade. This week, Dallas Pride officials responded to allegations of financial improprieties

A former Dallas Pride board member and a former volunteer lodge allegations of embezzlement, fraud entailing nonprofit

CAROLINE SAVOIE | Contributing Writer
carolinelsavoie@gmail.com

Six people in Dallas Pride leadership, including one board member and five volunteers, have resigned since November 2023 amidst allegations of embezzlement and tax fraud on the part of former and current board members. Jeremy Liebbe, former volunteer director of security, and Truett Calvert, former board secretary, said they worry that current leadership is brushing alleged criminal behavior “under the rug,” and they fear for the future of Dallas Pride if changes aren’t made.

But a spokesperson for Dallas Pride told Dallas Voice this week that the organization has been working to resolve any issues since the board first learned of problems with a former board member and allegations of financial improprieties last year.

“We would describe the financial stability and integrity of Dallas Pride as strong,” the spokesperson said. “The organization made immediate investigative steps once financial mismanagement was suspected in May 2023. We are actively working to transition our record keeping away from systems created by individuals who were involved in organizational mismanagement.”

Frank Holland

Resignations
“I am and will always be proud of my work and the proven results,” Liebbe said in his resignation letter dated July 5, 2024. “In stark contrast to all of that, the past year has seen the most tumultuous and disappointing series of events I have witnessed for this organization — and the threats have almost exclusively been internal and stem from the top of the organization.”

A Dallas Pride board spokesperson said that new leadership with extensive experience in nonprofit governance has joined the team, and they put in new working procedures to ensure good and lawful governance of the organization.

“These procedures include but are not limited to stricter procedures around purchasing and engaging trusted, impartial third parties to maintain our financial records,” the spokesperson said.

In August 2023, Liebbe said Frank Holland, president of Dallas Pride, asked him to lock the board treasurer, Adam Lynn, out of the nonprofit’s Microsoft Office 365 account. Lynn resigned the following day.

“That was when I first became aware of a deeply concerning pattern of errors, omissions and outright misconduct at the board of directors’ level within Dallas Pride,” Liebbe’s letter reads.

Liebbe said Lynn refused to give the board control of the financial books, but Liebbe, who is a certified fraud examiner, said he helped the board get the books back. He said audit logs prove that Lynn was the only board member with access to the books.

When Liebbe offered to conduct a forensic examination to find evidence of wrongdoing, he said Holland told him not to worry about it because the board wanted an external audit conducted. Both Calvert and Liebbe remember hearing that a CPA was handling the audit, but neither heard anything indicating that an outside audit had actually been conducted.

Both the 2021 and 2022 tax returns for Dallas Pride note that an independent audit was never conducted. Dates on those tax return documents show that Holland filed returns for both years in November 2023.

Both of the tax returns also note that Calvert possessed the nonprofit’s books, but Calvert, who’d been involved with Dallas Pride since 2015, said he never had access to any financial information. He said he didn’t know that his name was written as the financial custodian on the 2021 or 2022 tax returns.

The 2021 and 2022 tax returns also say that copies were given to all board members, but Calvert said he never saw either set of documents. “I never saw the books,” he said. “I never saw any tax returns either. I just took notes at board meetings.”

Jeremy Liebbe

‘Red flags’
Calvert said he started seeing “red flags” after the Dallas Pride parade in 2023. The board decided to fire Jaron Turnbow, former executive director, on the day of the parade. That’s when, Calvert said, questions of financial instability started coming up.

He said after the parade, the board appointed Christine Bengston as interim director, and that’s when “missing money” became part of the conversation.

“[Bengston] started looking at the bank statements and other financials to try to get an understanding of what we were looking at as an organization and where we stood financially,” Calvert said. “She started coming up with missing money and raising questions. We started questioning Adam about the financials, and he went silent.

“He unfriended us all on Facebook and blocked our numbers. Then he sent his letter of resignation,” Calvert said. “He said he would pay the money back if they didn’t go to the police.”

Liebbe said Bengston, who served as the interim executive director until Sherrell Cross was hired later that summer, became the treasurer in August 2023. Bengston resigned from that position on Nov. 20, 2023.

Then, when Cross became Dallas Pride’s executive director, Calvert said the board’s focus shifted to acquiring sponsorships. “It started to seem like the missing money was going to stay missing,” Calvert said.

In his resignation letter, Liebbe said the board estimated that more than $120,000 was missing from Dallas Pride’s account. Tax returns and financial books examined by Dallas Voice indicate at least $232,000 is missing.

Dallas Pride said that a recording of a phone call between Lynn and Holland reveals that Lynn “admits to stealing $250,000 from the organization in the forms of loans and credit cards.”

“Utilizing outside accountants and attorneys the internal investigation is still ongoing, as the embezzlement was kept off internal financial reports, as was with numerous credit cards, SBA loans and merchant loans,” a spokesperson said. “No sponsorship or public donations were embezzled.”

Calvert said this is not the first time money has gone missing with Dallas Pride. He said that last time, the then-treasurer admitted having taken the money, and, after he paid the money back, the board did not press charges.

In November 2023, Holland signed off on tax returns that listed Calvert as the bookkeeper.

A month later, Calvert said he got an email from Holland accusing him of having taken the missing money and telling him that the board would decide what to do. When Calvert said he couldn’t make the meeting, he said Holland and Cross told him that if he wasn’t at the meeting, they were going to assume he was guilty.

“I never had access to the bank accounts or finances,” Calvert said. “I had a credit card that the board issued to me that I never activated. I decided I had to walk away because this was going to end badly for the organization. I wasn’t going to let them intimidate me.”

Dallas Pride said Calvert did not name a specific reason for his decision to leave the board in his letter of resignation.

“In the board’s recollection and perception, Truett resigned because he could not fulfill his responsibilities as board secretary due to external work commitments,” a spokesperson said. “Specifically, board members report difficulty in receiving meeting minutes from Truett in a timely manner after meetings.

“In Frank’s follow up with Truett, Truett claimed to resign due to working conflicts with Sherrell. At no time did Sherrell or Frank ever accuse him of any wrongdoing,” the Dallas Pride spokesperson said.

Calvert tendered his resignation on Jan. 3, 2024.

“Dallas Pride was a family, and it broke my heart to let them know I was resigning,” he said. “This organization was a great organization, and it does great things for the community. It’s a safe space in Texas, which was always our goal. Everyone deserves to know what’s going on, whether it’s successful or failing miserably, as it is right now.”

Truett Calvert

Tax return issues
A closer look at Dallas Pride’s tax returns reveals several discrepancies. The organization’s financial books and tax returns do not match in some cases when it comes to revenue, expenses and net assets.

In the most extreme case, in the 2020 tax return, there is a $201,991 discrepancy between total revenue listed on the books and total revenue listed on the tax return, a $119,314 discrepancy between the books and the tax return in expenses, and a $55,733 difference between the books and the tax return when it comes to net assets.

Lynn had control of the books that year, and he signed off on the tax return.

Additionally, the 2021 revenue, expenses and net assets are different between the 2021 and 2022 tax returns.

In 2021, reported revenue was $224,200, but on the 2022 tax return, it said 2021’s total revenue was $236,700. The same goes for expenses, with the 2021 tax return saying Dallas Pride spent $294,422, while the 2022 tax return says that in 2021, the organization spent $259,425. The net assets in 2021 were listed as $57,722, but on the 2022 tax return, net assets for 2021 equaled $89,370.

Liebbe said Lynn had possession of the books during those years, but Calvert was listed as the bookkeeper on the tax returns.

In 2022, there’s a $27,000 difference between the total expenses reported on the tax return versus the financial books. The tax return lists the organization’s net assets that year as negative-$60,014, but the books show that the organization’s assets totaled $41,114. Lynn was treasurer during this time.

“There are false statements on these tax returns,” Liebbe said. “The board didn’t see the returns. Truett didn’t have access to the books, and the tax returns appear to include incorrect information — or at least different information than the books show.”

“Our tax returns from 2021 to 2023 were completed and filed by an external accountant recommended by Chris, a former board member in good standing with the organization,” Dallas Pride’s spokesperson said. “As we continue to investigate the extent of Adam’s and possibly others financial mismanagement, we will make full use of our ability to amend tax returns to reflect accurate accounting if needed.”

Liebbe said that to his knowledge, Holland and Cross haven’t gone to the police or FBI about Lynn’s alleged misappropriation of funds. Because Lynn has lived in Minneapolis for the last several years, Liebbe said that if he transferred any money to himself, he could be guilty of a federal crime of wire fraud.

“For almost a year, the Dallas Pride board of directors has failed to address the suspected fraud and embezzlement committed by Adam,” Liebbe said in his resignation letter. “The fact that the board of directors has still not filed a criminal offense report with the Dallas Police Department or Federal Bureau of Investigation is unethical and unconscionable.”

Dallas Pride said its ongoing investigation “will soon conclude with a complete and total amount embezzled and naming all parties involved.”

“We have an accountant looking into all filings from the last couple years. If needed, amendments will be filed with the IRS or appropriate agencies,” the spokesperson said.

“Dallas Pride Inc. will file a criminal complaint with the Dallas District Attorney’s office and federal authorities, and civil cases will also be filed in Dallas County. These suit filings will be public record.”

Background checks
In his resignation letter, Liebbe said that in April 2024, at a meeting in the S4 Rose Room, he told Holland he could run background checks on staff and volunteers for Dallas Pride. He said he asked Holland if he wanted to run the board directors and staff, and Holland said no.

But Liebbe said once he started seeing discrepancies in the finances, he decided to search Holland’s name in Dallas’s public crime records.

Public records show that Holland was charged with six counts of aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon for a series of crimes that occurred between July 20, 1981, and March 18, 1982, in Dallas and Highland Park. He pleaded guilty to five of those offenses in August 1982, according to police records.

Holland was released from state prison on Oct. 10, 1997, and he remains on parole until June 13, 2027.

“I’m sure he’s a very different person now, but the optics are bad,” Liebbe said. “That’s why I think he didn’t want me to run background checks on board members.”

“The board is aware of Frank’s criminal record,” a Dallas Pride spokesperson said. “Frank’s charges are over 40 years old, taking place when Frank was in his teens. They have no bearing on Frank’s performance and conduct as a board member of Dallas Pride, an organization he has been a part of for over a decade.”

Liebbe and Calvert think that Holland’s criminal history might be part of the reason he hasn’t reported the alleged embezzlement. Liebbe said the report could trigger an audit, and if Holland is found liable for falsifying tax returns, it could be a violation of his parole.

“It’s bad from a PR standpoint, but it could be bad for Frank when it comes to him being on parole,” Calvert said.

At the meeting at S4, Leibbe said Cross told him that she did not trust books that had past fraud in them, and Dallas Pride was deleting the old records and starting a new financial records account moving forward.

“This concerns me as such a step is more often used to cover up and ignore past fraud rather than to investigate and properly address fraud and embezzlement,” Liebbe said in his letter.

“Dallas Pride moved in July 2024 to transition away from its existing QuickBooks account, which was created by Adam Lynn and maintained by a volunteer of Dallas Pride who was ultimately not authorized to conduct financial transactions on behalf of the organization,” a Dallas Pride spokesperson said. “The board members who did have access to this QuickBooks account did not have access to the login records and do not feel that the account is reliable for continued use.

“All history of transactions have been downloaded and imported into a QuickBooks account now owned and managed by Dallas Pride, Inc.,” the spokesperson said.

Dallas Pride said the financial books account “will be closed and archived for our records and continued investigation, but it will not be deleted.”

Dallas Pride said it has and will continue to be a community-owned and -led organization.

“We invite the involvement of our community members to steward and grow the impact of our organization beyond the annual Pride Festival and Parade weekend; applications for new steering committee members will be accepted this fall, and we will recruit new members of our board starting in January 2025,” the Dallas Pride spokesperson said.