Estate Planning Attorney and Self-Help Author Pleads Guilty to Stealing $3M From Clients

A Pennsylvania estate planning attorney who recently published a self-help book on weathering life’s adversities has pleaded guilty to stealing more than $3 million from client funds to pay for personal and business expenses.  She faces up to 30 years in prison.

Wendy Weikal-Beauchat (right), a Gettysburg estate and long-term care planning attorney, was charged with defrauding eight clients, including the elderly, between 2007 and 2013 and then covering her tracks by providing the clients with fake certificates of deposit and IRS 1099 forms for reporting interest.   Weikal-Beauchat was disbarred in February 2013 and on November 15, 2013, pleaded guilty in federal court to money laundering and wire fraud.  "You are in an astonishing amount of trouble here," John E. Jones III, U.S. judge for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, told Weikal-Beauchat, 46, who could also face $500,000 in fines.

In September, Ms. Weikal-Beauchat published Courage for the Journey: Wisdom for the Broken Road (AuthorHouse, 2013), which “assembles a collection of wisdom to ignite courage, hope, and strength in those caught in the inevitable storms of life,” according to promotional material accompanying the book’s Amazon.com listing. Characterizing Weikal-Beauchat as “the proud survivor of many of life's broken roads,” her bio states that “She cherishes each scar as a souvenir of her many travels down the Broken Road. Ms. Weikal-Beauchat has learned that, in life, we all have choices, and we all travel the Broken Road at one point or another. Some travelers grow and prosper from the Broken Road. Others fall into despair. The difference is what the traveler learns from the journey. ‘Prospering during adversity’ is her personal motto. Teaching this principle to others is her calling.”

Investigators are trying to identify other clients who may have been victimized by Ms. Weikal-Beauchat’s scheme.

At the time of her disbarment, Weikal-Beauchat was the principal of Beauchat & Beauchat, LLC, an estate planning firm founded in 1993 by her ex-husband, Gettysburg Magisterial District Judge Mark Beauchat, according to the Waynesboro (PA) Record Herald.