About the only piece of evidence the prosecution didn’t have in the murder case against 20-year-old Patrick Fluker was an eyewitness testifying that he was seen shooting 29-year-old Tiffany Mendez in the head.Allen County prosecutors added additional charges Friday to the criminal case against local lawyer Daniel E. Serban after investigators said he admitted misappropriating money from an estate account.
Charged this week with corrupt business influence and theft, Serban, of Roanoke, now faces additional charges of forgery and theft.
In the original charges, Serban is accused of failing to distribute money paid into Serban Law Office’s Trust Account to the appropriate clients or to those entitled by court order to receive it.
But when he was arrested Thursday, Serban told officers some of the money he used to pay off the original client, after he was confronted, had been taken from money put into the trust account for an estate. He told investigators he forged the name of the estate’s personal representative on the check.
According to court documents, Serban admitted to police he had taken the money, apologizing to the client. He is scheduled to appear in Allen Superior Court on Tuesday.
As a condition of his bail, he must surrender his passport.
