A Joliet Housing Authority official accused of defrauding the Chicago Housing Authority of nearly $200,000 with her husband’s help was drowning in debt and had filed for bankruptcy around the same time she was hired by the south suburban agency, court records show.

In 2010 — just a few years after Cook County prosecutors said Charlene Potts and her now estranged spouse Scott Washington embezzled the CHA — Potts, claimed she owed more than $280,000, mostly for house payments for a home in Crete, according to her bankruptcy filings.