{"id":408904,"date":"2026-09-24T03:20:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T03:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/408904\/"},"modified":"2026-09-24T03:20:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T03:20:09","slug":"former-campaign-treasurer-admits-to-stealing-200k-from-st-pete-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/408904\/","title":{"rendered":"Former campaign treasurer admits to stealing $200K from St. Pete mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ex-Welch \"Ex-Welch Ex-Welch campaign treasurer pleads guilty to fraud<\/a> <\/p>\n

St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch says his campaign took a significant hit after more than $200,000 went missing from his campaign account earlier this year. The former treasurer, Yolanda Brown, pleaded guilty to stealing more than $1 million from 20 clients over the years. FOX 13’s Briona Arradondo reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – St. Petersburg<\/a> Mayor Ken Welch is speaking out after his former campaign treasurer pleaded guilty in federal court to stealing more than $200,000 from his reelection account.<\/p>\n

St. Petersburg mayor campaign theft <\/p>\n

What we know:<\/p>\n

Former campaign treasurer Yolanda Brown pleaded guilty to wire fraud on Wednesday in a Pennsylvania federal courtroom after transferring client money to pay for personal expenses. Federal filings show Brown stole more than $1 million from 20 clients, including a candidate for Congress in Pennsylvania and Mayor Ken Welch.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Welch discovered three large, unexplained withdrawals while meeting a campaign funds reporting deadline and immediately filed a report to spark an investigation. Brown faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and full restitution, with sentencing scheduled for Jan. 26.<\/p>\n

\"\" Federal wire fraud investigation <\/p>\n

What we don’t know:<\/p>\n

Federal authorities have not yet released an itemized breakdown of how Brown spent the stolen funds. It remains unclear how much of the stolen $200,000 Welch will ultimately recover through restitution.<\/p>\n

Campaign treasurer fraud history <\/p>\n

The backstory:<\/p>\n

Welch hired Brown as treasurer during his first election in 2021 and experienced no issues until 2025. Brown appeared highly credible to political candidates, because she previously served as a treasurer for state legislative candidates and elected officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Welch only learned about her broader history of defrauding clients after she stopped responding to his campaign and vanished.<\/p>\n

St. Petersburg reelection plan <\/p>\n

What’s next:<\/p>\n

Welch expressed relief that FBI agents tracked Brown down after she changed her name and fled. Though missing more than $200,000 hurts his ability to push his message to voters, Welch says he remains committed to reaching city residents to discuss his track record and future plans.<\/p>\n

The Source: The information in this story was gathered by FOX 13\u2019s Briona Arradondo, who interviewed St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch, as well as federal court filings and statements from the FBI.<\/p>\n

St. Petersburg<\/a>Politics<\/a>Crime and Public Safety<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ex-Welch campaign treasurer pleads guilty to fraud St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch says his campaign took a significant…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":408905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[630,47,115,1157,99,202,204,203,199,201,200,628],"class_list":["post-408904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-crime-publicsafety","tag-fl","tag-news","tag-pinellas","tag-politics","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-us"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408904","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=408904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/408905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=408904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=408904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=408904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}