WINTER PARK, Fla. — A Winter Park attorney is going to prison after detectives said he bilked a 105-year-old woman out of her fortune.
Matthew Roby was in court Friday to take a plea from prosecutors.
His scheme unraveled after the woman told detectives three years ago that he somehow got a hold of her millions.
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Helen Kuhn was 108 years old when she died.
Kuhn was a woman who did not seem to slow down until she had a fall last year.
At 60, she got married for the first time, got her pilot’s license after that, and drove until she was 101.
Her best friend also said she was good with finances.
Kuhn had $2.3 million in her accounts, was living alone and doing great.
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That was until her family attorney took her money in 2019.
She was an opportune target.
Thanks to the work of Detective Chris Williams, the now-disbarred attorney Matthew Roby took a plea deal for five years in prison.
Williams said that in 2019, Kuhn got a large tax bill and didn’t know why.
Roby told her to just pay it, but something didn’t sit right so she went to the sheriff’s office.
According to the 3-year investigation, Roby had somehow become her power of attorney, took her money and transferred it to another bank and spent some of it.
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From March to September of 2019 he transferred $490,000 from her bank account to her firm’s trust account. From there he spent that money for his own purpose to pay other people.
But didn’t spend it all. She believed he took it and was waiting for her to pass away to use it.
Kuhn was not in the courtroom Friday to see the conclusion of the case because she died 16 days ago while waiting for justice.
But she knew he had been caught and would not be able to do this to anyone again.
She was angry and upset and kept saying she couldn’t wait to hear the jingle of the keys when he got arrested.
Prosecutors said most of the money that Roby took went to pay into another estate, but he was not charged with any crime in that case.
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Roby’s father was also Kuhn’s attorney before his son.
Ronald Roby, according to records, was also disbarred in 2014 for misappropriation of funds.
A client said that tens of thousands of dollars were removed from his account, which were unaccounted for.
Roby will be sentenced in August and will have to pay back the money he spent.
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