White Collar Crimes Lawyer in Mesa, AZ

In Mesa, an employer that believes a worker took company money reports it to the Mesa Police Document and Financial Crimes Unit, part of the department's Criminal Investigations Division. The unit posts an embezzlement reporting packet written for that employer, to be filled out only after the business has a police report number.

The packet has the business organize its accusation around the scheme, the suspect and the evidence. It asks for the employee's job application, job description and payroll records, plus cancelled checks, bank and card statements, general ledgers and deposit slips for each alleged scheme. A lead sheet states the loss, broken out scheme by scheme, and the sample builds that loss from an internal or outside audit. Everything goes into two labeled binders for the assigned investigator. The posted version is dated 2008, so current practice may differ.

So the detective's starting point is the business's own case, prepared by people who believe they lost money. An audit can count payments an owner approved, miss a commission or expense arrangement, or fold separate decisions into one scheme. When disclosure arrives, we read those binders the way a prosecutor would, then look for what they left out.

Mesa's victim advice also shapes repayment talks. The unit's page tells victims not to sign a civil repayment agreement with an offender they know unless they are willing to give up prosecution, even if the agreement is never honored. A signed promise to repay can surface later as evidence of knowledge and intent. Route any discussion of money through a lawyer, and do not contact the employer or co-workers about the accusation.

Arizona has no crime called embezzlement. The conduct is usually charged as theft under A.R.S. § 13-1802(A)(2), which covers knowingly converting entrusted property or services for an unauthorized term or use, and the theft statute lists no defense for meaning to pay it back. Value sets the class. Below $1,000, it generally stays a class 1 misdemeanor, and the Mesa City Prosecutor can bring it in Mesa Municipal Court; $1,000 starts the felony range, and $25,000 or more reaches the top class, class 2. Under § 13-1801(B), takings that were part of one scheme or course of conduct may be combined to reach a higher class.

Felony cases occurring in Mesa belong to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office, the City Prosecutor's page says. A prosecutor there can send a report back for more work, reject it, refer it elsewhere, or charge it, and the office has named White Collar Offenses among its specialized crime bureaus.

Larger or longer cases can add fraudulent schemes and artifices, a class 2 felony under § 13-2310 that does not require proof that anyone relied on the false representation. If the benefit totals $100,000 or more, subsection (C) takes probation and a suspended sentence off the table, apart from narrow statutory release provisions, and it contains no exception for paying the money back. Where the conduct concerns City of Mesa business, such as a contract, a permit or a reimbursement, § 13-2311 reaches knowingly falsifying or concealing a material fact as part of a scheme to defraud or deceive: a class 5 felony with no benefit element.

Money laundering under § 13-2317 is a class 6, 3 or 2 felony, depending on the degree. Some forms turn on knowledge, including what the accused had reason to know about the money's source; others cover structuring to dodge state reporting rules or running an unlicensed money transmitting business. A pattern of first or second degree violations totaling $100,000 or more in any twelve-month period brings exposure to forfeiture of substitute assets at three times the amount involved in the whole pattern.

The County Attorney keeps most of these felonies, though certain state cases go instead to the Arizona Attorney General's Office, often when the conduct spans counties, a state agency built the case, or the county attorney passed it along. We handle these matters whichever office brought the charge. Separately, the U.S. Attorney can take up bank, mail, wire and tax allegations. Nova Law Group appears in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, which hears those cases in Phoenix, not Mesa.

Avoiding jail is not the same as avoiding a conviction. Employers, banks and insurers can read a theft or fraud conviction as a dishonesty offense, and a licensing board can open its own proceeding. A felony conviction makes a person a prohibited possessor under A.R.S. § 13-3101 until firearm rights are restored. On conviction, § 13-603(C) requires restitution of the full economic loss the court finds, paid through the clerk of the court, and a civil suit over the same money remains possible. If you are not a U.S. citizen, get immigration advice before any plea.