Theft up to $30M alleged; Company rep says case centers on ‘money, sex, drugs’

A Morgan City investment company is alleging that multiple people may have stolen up to $30 million from the company in a case, possibly dating to the 1980s, that is “all about money, sex and drugs,” according to a company spokesman.
Marwan Mohey-El-Dien, Capital Management Consultants spokesman, said this morning, “We’re alleging theft of anywhere between $15 (million) to $30 million.”
Mohey-El-Dien said the company filed a civil suit Tuesday in the 16th Judicial District Court against numerous parties in a case centered around money, sex and drugs.
In July 2014, former secretary Karen Dehart Duhon, 59, of Morgan City, and bookkeeper Donna Sue Peveto, 58, of Houma, were charged with stealing nearly $2 million from Capital Management Consultants Inc. in Morgan City, their former employer. Duhon was charged on eight counts of theft of more than $1,500 totaling $1.23 million, while Peveto was charged on seven counts for theft more than $1,500 totaling $633,700.
The charges were the result of an investigation that began in March by Morgan City police. The company’s president Scott Tucker passed away in January 2014.
The case involves a sexual relationship between Tucker and Duhon, who started stealing money from the company, Mohey-El-Dien said. Peveto found out about the theft and Tucker and Duhon started paying Peveto to “keep her quiet,” Mohey-El-Dien said.
“To further the act, they winded up involving other people to help them doctor documents, including selling a home to themselves for $10 and mineral rights for $10, borrowing $300,000 from the company, buying a home and giving it to the children and then making the transaction disappear with convoluted accounting,” Mohey-El-Dien said.
Mohey-El-Dien is managing the criminal and civil cases relating to the alleged theft, he said. Mohey-El-Dien is married to Laura Guarisco, daughter of company founder the late Peter V. Guarisco, who discovered the theft after Tucker died, Mohey-El-Dien said.
“She asked (for) the checks and the records to start being able to give them to the new accountant, and she started noticing some major discrepancies in terms of the money that was supposed to be paid as wages for Karen Duhon,” Mohey-El-Dien said.
Guarisco turned the information over to accountant Mark Munson and company President Victor Guarisco, Mohey-El-Dien said. According to affidavits, from 1999 to 2014, the company identified $2.87 million in suspected fraudulent transactions from Duhon and $2.43 million in fraudulent transactions from Peveto.
Company officials allege that the co-conspirators are multiple people including “high-powered attorneys in Louisiana,” Dien said.
The company alleges that the company’s former Controller CPA James Scott Tucker was the leader behind the conspiracy, Mohey-El-Dien said.
The company also alleges that the people who knew about and benefited from theft were Armond Duhon, Karen Duhon’s husband; Jessica Duhon, Karen Duhon’s daughter; other family members in Texas; and area attorney Michael Aloise, Mohey-El-Dien said.
Aloise is accused of enabling part of the theft to occur, Mohey-El-Dien said. Company officials are asking for records to be able to find out the extent of the theft, he said.
“We know that we have $15 million that we forensically proved was stolen,” Mohey-El-Dien said. The company filed suit to make sure officials get a motion of discovery to determine how much more money the accused co-conspirators actually stole, Mohey-El-Dien said.
The theft from the company could potentially date back to the early to mid-1980s, Mohey-El-Dien said.
When the Morgan City Police Department issued a search warrant regarding the theft, police also found drugs in Karen Duhon’s home that belonged to her daughter Jessica Duhon, he said.
On Nov. 4, 2014, Jessica Duhon, 32, of Morgan City, was arrested on a warrant for possession of drug paraphernalia, a warrant for possession of Schedule II Oxycodone/Hydrocodone and a warrant for possession of Schedule IV Alprazolam.
However, Morgan City Police Capt. James Blair said the drug warrants are not in any way related to the Capital Management Consultants case. Blair said when police did a search of Karen Duhon’s home in relation to the Capital Management Consultants case, they found crushed pills with no prescription and an arrest warrant was issued for Jessica Duhon.
Mohey-El-Dien said the case is going to get bigger and “it’s the beginning of the case not the end of the case.” He is expecting from two to four more arrests in connection.
Blair said the investigation is continuing and additional charges are possible.