{"id":260177,"date":"2026-05-06T04:27:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T04:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/260177\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T04:27:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T04:27:11","slug":"pinellas-cpa-attorney-indicted-in-nearly-900k-embezzlement-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/260177\/","title":{"rendered":"Pinellas CPA, attorney indicted in nearly $900K embezzlement case"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"h944129-p1\" class=\"permalinkable\">Federal prosecutors have charged a Palm Harbor CPA and attorney with embezzling more than $890,000 from one of her clients \u2014 an unnamed \u201cpublic figure\u201d who lives in the Middle District of Florida.<\/p>\n<p id=\"h944129-p2\" class=\"permalinkable\">Melissia Gathreaux, 56, has been charged with six counts of wire fraud, according to her federal indictment and the U.S. Attorney&#8217;s office for the Middle District, based in Tampa. If convicted, she faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in federal prison on each count.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p id=\"h944129-p3\" class=\"permalinkable\">According to her indictment, Gauthreaux was the founder, president and managing member of Accounting Resources and Management Services, or ARMS LLC, a full-service accounting firm established in Palm Harbor in 2013, records show.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p id=\"h944129-p4\" class=\"permalinkable\">From 2017 through 2021, Gauthreaux is accused of using her business to steal $894,274.26 from her client, authorities allege. Gauthreaux had signatory authority on her client\u2019s bank accounts and was able to remove the funds without the client\u2019s knowledge or consent, the indictment says.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p id=\"h944129-p5\" class=\"permalinkable\">If convicted, Gauthreaux faces a forfeiture order for the same amount, prosecutors say. Assistant United States Attorney Merrilyn Hoenemeyer will prosecute the case.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal prosecutors have charged a Palm Harbor CPA and attorney with embezzling more than $890,000 from one of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-260177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}