Seattle – A 47-year-old man from Everett, Washington was sentenced today by Seattle U.S. District Court to 2 years in prison for his embezzlement scheme that stole more than $ 1 million from a commercial flooring company he co-founded with a friend, acting U.S. lawyer Tessa M. Gorman said. David M. Gluth founded Gluth Commercial Flooring with a friend who invested $ 500,000 to start the business. Between 2011 and 2016, Gluth and a co-conspirator raided the company’s accounts to pay for everything from a home loan to luxury vacations, Nordstrom bills and liquor purchases. During the sentencing hearing, US District Judge Richard A. Jones told Gluth: “You treated the victim like your personal ATM…. Your return on investment (from your friend) was to orchestrate a significant and devastating “fraud” on the victim.
According to the records filed in the case, Gluth conspired with the company’s accountant, Jodi Hamrick, not only to plunder company funds, but also to defraud financial institutions by taking loans and obtaining lines. credit without the knowledge or permission of the co-owner of the business. The two used company funds for various personal expenses. The lies and deception in this scheme involved forged signatures, forged documents, altered records, secret bank accounts, secret credit cards, false accounting entries and false statements in statements and court records. The evidence in the case includes years of Skype instant messages between Gluth and Hamrick, showing the planning and execution of the fraud in great detail.
In the end, the co-owner of the company had to go to court to try to get the truth about the company’s embezzlement. And even while this litigation was ongoing, Gluth continued to hurt his former business partner by considering starting a new flooring business and taking pending jobs and income with him. Even after a King County Superior Court judge barred the two men from having anything to do with the business, they violated the order by attempting to modify a personal loan by placing it in the Company Name.
The flooring company went bankrupt in 2016, and the victimized business partner was left in debt.
Judge Jones noted that the damage to the victim was more than financial, saying the victim “had lost her ability to trust others. . . which can never be restored. . . such breach of trust cannot be recovered. It’s a permanent loss “
Gluth was indicted in November 2020 and pleaded guilty in January 2021. Gluth accepted restitution of $ 325,000.
The matter was investigated by the FBI. The case was continued by Deputy United States Attorney Michael Dion and Special Deputy United States Prosecutor Jessica Ly.
