Catherine Hoke

Catherine Hoke (previously Catherine Rohr) is the founder and former CEO of Defy Ventures, a United States-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. 
In 2009, she resigned as CEO from the Prison Entrepreneurship Program after admitting to sexual relationships with formerly incarcerated students. In 2018, she resigned as CEO from Defy Ventures, also launched by Hoke, after further allegations of sexual harassment.
In 2018, she released her book "A Second Chance: For You, For Me and For the Rest of Us." 
Background.
Early life.
Hoke was born in Montreal, Canada. After graduating from the University of California, Hoke was hired by Summit Partners, a venture capital firm, and several years later became the Director of Investment Development at American Securities Capital Partners in New York City. 
Prison Entrepreneurship Program.
In 2004, Hoke toured several Texas prisons and found that many of the incarcerated men she met possessed strong business acumen, sales skills, and entrepreneurial qualities, and that many gangs and drug rings are run similarly to corporations —with bylaws, bookkeeping functions, marketing strategies, and quality control programs. Hoke recruited executive volunteers and conducted a business seminar. Four months later, she ran a business pitch competition, which was covered by the Wall Street Journal. She turned these efforts into the Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP), a Texas, organization teaching entrepreneurship and character development to incarcerated men, some of which she went on to have illegal sexual relations with while inside prison walls 
In 2009, Hoke was banned from Texas prisons after she admitted to having sexual relationships with PEP participants after their release from prison. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice deemed those relationships inappropriate.
Defy Ventures.
After being forced out from PEP in October 2010, Hoke founded Defy Ventures in New York City. 
Its vision is "to solve the issue of high recidivism rates through entrepreneurship programs that taught incarcerated participants a comprehensive business skill-set . 
Books.
Hoke released her book, "A Second Chance: For You, For Me and For the Rest of Us" in early 2018 with a foreword written by Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook). I; the book is about how she came to serve incarcerated people. The book was published by Hoke's mentor, Seth Godin.
Awards.
In 2007, Hoke received the Texas Governor's Award for Criminal Justice Volunteer Service for Social Innovation. In 2007, Hoke also received the Manhattan Institute's Social Entrepreneurship Award. In 2008, Hoke was inducted into the Philanthropy World Hall of Fame, and PEP received the “Rising Star” award from the Monitor Group/Fast Company Social Capitalist Awards. 
In 2014, Hoke was named in Fast Company's Most Creative People in Business and was elected an Ashoka Fellow. In 2015 she received the MDC Partners Humanitarian Award on behalf of Defy Ventures and was named as a WIRED #maketechhuman Agent of Change. "Forbes" included Hoke in its 2017 40 Women to Watch Over 40 list.
Sexual Harassment Allegations.
In January 2018, a number of allegations against Hoke and Defy Ventures were made by a former employee. The allegations included sexual harassment, having a sexual relationship with a formerly incarcerated participant, misleading donors, exaggerating the success of the program, and not accurately tracking outcomes of former program participants. While the Prison PEP Program espoused Christian values, Ms. Hoke(née Rorh) was actively breaking prison rules and having sexual relationships with multiple offenders, smuggling in contraband which was provided to her “pet” program participant inmates who were in the PEP and at the same time, hypocritically rejecting program applicants who didn’t measure up to her “Star-Quality Appearance”. These are proven allegations which led to her being barred from Texas Prisons and being removed as CEO. program