Andrea Johnson was found guilty of Filing a Fraudulent Report and Reckless Contribution to a Campaign after a two-day jury trial. Johnson will remain on bond until her sentencing, which is scheduled for January 22, 2026.

Andrea Johnson

According to court documents, Andrea Johnson was a candidate for the 2022 General Election and signed an official form reporting "large contribution" donations to her campaign. The sole person listed as making contributions was a current school board member and the former Goshen Mayor, Allan Kauffman. The donation listed by Johnson was for the amount of $1,177.00. However, an investigation found social media posts and an email stating that the funds were not from Kauffman, but instead money collected from multiple contributors who wanted to stay anonymous.

The same was allegedly true for all of the school board candidates who reported that contributions were from Allan Kauffman. That includes current Goshen Community Schools School Board members Jose Elizalde, Mario Garber and Roger Nafziger. Documents show this all stemmed from a retired teacher hoping to prevent certain candidates from being elected. Kauffman said the intent was to collect money from the teacher's "friends," then the teacher would write a check to Kauffman, and he would go on to write checks for each of the candidates.

The contributions made to each candidate were used for the purpose of paying to send mass campaign mailers to promote the candidates for the upcoming election.

Johnson is the only defendant in this case to have her charges brought to a jury trial.

Kauffman pleaded guilty to all six counts he was charged with and was sentenced in April to concurrent terms of probation amounting to one year served.

Elizalde, Garber and Nafziger all accepted guilty plea agreements for one of their charges and were sentenced between August and November of 2024 to one year suspended on probation. Therefore, each of their sentences have now been carried out.