Former Seattle-area finance director pleads guilty to embezzling $3M from non-profits

SEATTLE - A former finance director for two non-profits has pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $3 million from her employers at the organizations over a period of nine years. 

According to the charging information and plea agreement, in 1999, now-62-year-old Susana Tantico of Renton began working for a non-profit that provides healthcare to underserved populations. She later ended up becoming their finance director.

Between 2011 and 2020, prosecutors say Tantico used the non-profit's debit and credit cards to withdraw over $1 million at casinos for gambling. Prosecutors also say she used these cards to pay for personal vacations, a family trip to Disney World, trips to Vegas and San Diego and used those cards to buy $123,000 worth of purchases at Nordstrom and Apple stores.  

She was able to get away with it by disgusting the payments as legitimate expenses, like buying medical supplies. 

In 2020, she did the same thing at a different non-profit that focused on criminal justice issues, according to prosecutors. She racked up nearly $900,000 of the non-profit's money on gambling, her mortgage, and putting that money into her own bank account. 

Tantico pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud. 

Prosecutors recommended a sentence of just under three and a half years in prison. The judge in her case can impose any sentence they choose, that's allowed by law. Wire fraud is punishable by up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

She will be sentenced on Aug. 15.