320/69 Monday, June 15, 2026
A former IT employee of the Saydel Community School District in Des Moines, Iowa, has been sentenced to 21 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to computer fraud charges under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). The attacks, which continued for more than 21 months, disrupted educational services, prevented staff from accessing critical systems, and resulted in tens of thousands of dollars in remediation costs. The defendant, Ezekiel Dean Potter, 34, previously served as a Senior IT Support Specialist for the district from May 2022 to April 2023.
According to prosecutors, after leaving his position, Potter retained credentials that allowed him to access school systems and repeatedly used them to conduct unauthorized activities. His actions included deleting the school district’s Facebook page, locking employees out of educational platforms and accounts, and attempting to reset usernames and passwords across multiple systems. He also targeted the district’s Apple School Manager environment, deleting user records, passwords, phone numbers, billing information, and device management server data. As a result, staff lost access to the platform and were unable to manage district-issued MacBooks and iPads for approximately one week.
Court records further revealed that in January 2025, Potter accessed the district’s Schoology learning management system through a Google Administrator account and deleted the account of an IT staff member, preventing teachers from accessing the platform and disrupting classroom activities for approximately two hours. He later deleted nine Gmail accounts belonging to current and former employees, including the Director of IT and district administrators. Investigators linked some of the malicious activity to IP addresses associated with another employer of Potter and discovered evidence on a USB drive containing spreadsheets with usernames and passwords for accounts within the Saydel Community School District. In addition to the prison sentence, the court ordered Potter to serve three years of supervised release, comply with restrictions on computer use, employment, and financial activities, and pay $59,668.81 in restitution to the Saydel Community School District.