- 4 -
and his affiliation with the estate was terminated in February
1992. Soon thereafter, Edna hired Roger Schilling (Schilling), a
certified public accountant, to perform an extensive examination
of the estate. Schilling's examination revealed that Mr.
Peterson had misappropriated $136,901.92 from the estate during
1990, and $186,000 from the estate during 1991.
In March 1994, Mr. Peterson was indicted on three counts of
theft, under Wis. Stat. sec. 943.20(1)(b)(West 1996). Mr.
Peterson pleaded guilty to two counts and was sentenced to 15
years in prison.
In addition to Mr. Peterson's occupation as an attorney and
petitioner's occupation as a college professor, the couple also
owned and operated a beef farm during the years at issue. The
name of this farm was "Mill Road Limousins."
During the years at issue, petitioner and Mr. Peterson
maintained at least 2 joint bank accounts at local financial
institutions. One of these accounts was with Valley Bank (the
Valley account) and the other was with Menomonie Farmer's Credit
Union (the Menomonie account). The couple conducted their
personal and business affairs from both accounts. Between
February 3, 1990 and January 3, 1991, petitioner and Mr. Peterson
wrote checks against the Valley account totaling $111,100.72. Of
this amount, petitioner wrote checks totaling $88,532.95, and Mr.
Peterson wrote checks totaling $22,567.77. The records for the
Valley account indicate that the account had a balance of
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