Former Iowa superintendent charged with federal firearms offense after ICE arrest

Former Des Moines Public Schools Superintendent Ian Roberts was charged on Thursday with possessing firearms while in the U.S. illegally, less than a week after he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials. 

According to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Iowa, investigators found Roberts in possession of four firearms — one in his car and three at his Des Moines home. 

Last Friday, Roberts was detained by ICE, which cited a removal order signed by an immigration judge in 2024. Roberts also has an existing weapons charge from February 2020, the complaint added. 

The criminal complaint says that Roberts initially sped away from ICE officers in his Jeep Cherokee, before abandoning the vehicle in nearby grass. 

Iowa State Patrol officers later located Roberts in the brush roughly 200 yards from his vehicle, and he was then taken into ICE custody, according to the filing.

Upon searching Roberts’ vehicle, investigators found a loaded handgun wrapped in a towel, the complaint noted. A trace for the weapon revealed that a woman believed to Roberts’s wife purchased the handgun in Arkansas in 2019. 

According to ICE, Roberts was also in possession of $3,000 in cash and a fixed blade hunting knife upon his arrest. 

Roberts resigned on Tuesday, one day after he was placed on unpaid leave by the school district and his education license was revoked by Iowa’s Board of Educational Examiners. 

Roberts is a Guyanan citizen who arrived in the U.S. in March 1999 on a student visa, which expired in March 2004, according to the complaint. Roberts applied three times — in May 2001, May 2018 and June 2018 — for permanent residence, but was rejected by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

He became the Des Moines schools superintendent in July 2023. 

The school district initially put Roberts on paid leave Saturday, with officials saying they thought he was a legal U.S. citizen. 

The Associated Press reported Wednesday that the Des Moines school board hired Roberts despite learning that he lied about receiving a doctorate in educational leadership from Morgan State University in 2007. While public records show Roberts was enrolled in the doctorate program from 2002 to 2007, he did not complete his degree. 

"Our position at this time — he has a presumption of innocence," Roberts's attorney, Alfredo Parrish, said on Thursday, the AP reported. “He will exercise his right to indicate to the court, if he is indicted, that he’s not guilty."

Parrish also said that his client has not been indicted. The Woodbury County Sheriff's Office said in a social media post on Thursday that Roberts was no longer being held there and claimed he was taken into custody by the Department of Justice.

The Associated Press contributed.