Without question, one of the most entertaining stories to hit the industry in recent years is the arrest and indictment of Jennifer Garula-Mers, former CEO of East Polk County Association of REALTORS (EPCAR):

A Polk County Sheriff’s Office investigation culminated in the arrest of the former CEO of The East Polk County Association of Realtors (EPCAR) on Thursday, November 20, 2025. Garula-Mers was terminated from her employment with EPCAR in August 2024.

Detectives issued a warrant for the arrest of 53-year-old Jennifer Garula-Mers of Spring Hill, Florida yesterday, November 20, 2025 for Grand Theft over $20,000 and less than $100,000, F.S.S. 812.014(2)(b)(1). She was taken into custody yesterday by the Hernando County Sheriff’s Office.

It was partly entertaining because Grady Judd, the Sheriff of Polk County, is one of the most amusing law enforcement officials in the nation. He has gone viral many times before for his straight tough talk. This is his press conference about the EPCAR arrest:

Most of us laughed, then tut-tutted, and felt sorry for EPCAR.

However, the story that Sheriff Judd told in this press conference requires much, much more discussion. It is a pattern far too common in organized real estate, and warrants—nay, demands—significant reforms in how Associations and the MLS are operated and governed.

This is a public post, since the issue is of wide public concern not only for REALTORS but for the country and society, as corruption and crimes involve law enforcement as well.

This is going to be very long, so if you want more of my suggestions for reform, skip the long list of cases of theft, fraud, and embezzlement to suggested reforms.

The EPCAR Saga

The story is as Sheriff Judd told, and I don’t believe anyone could have told it better. Watch the whole video above if you haven’t already.

There are two details about the story that really bothered me, because I had seen it before far too many times.

Ultra Top Secret Financials

First, Sheriff Judd says that the theft was discovered when RJ Webb was elected President of EPCAR and started noticing problems. He demanded financials and documents from Garula-Mers, who flatly refused to provide them. I wish I could say that Associations and MLSs refusing to provide financial documents was unusual. It is not.

In 2012, I wrote about a giant mess in Chicago when the Chicago Association of REALTORS sued one of its own members, Andrea Geller, for defamation. Here’s what I wrote then:

In brief, the CAR brought this lawsuit for defamation against Andrea Geller, a REALTOR with Coldwell Banker, roughly two weeks after this story broke in the industry press. The original article was a barely-nothing story, of the inside-baseball, politics of the Association variety that interests precious few people. Apart from the diehard members — if you will, the truly committed members of the Association — I’m guessing that most readers of Chicago Agent skipped over it.

But Andrea Geller, who serves or served on the Finance Committee of the CAR, started writing comments on that story. She backed up Mr. Floss’s claim that he had been pushed out as President because he demanded financial audits, then added a few comments of her own about the opaque financials, in her view, of CAR:

Over the time I sat as a member of the finance committee it became clear to me that there were irregularities which when asked about would be responded to in a round about way or direct responses from the CEO such as she does not answer to the committee, only to her board of directors. It is financials. Numbers are numbers not a short story or novel long explanation.

The original story, which is linked to above, is that the President of CAR was impeached by the Board and was fired, because he asked to see the financials. From the story in Chicago Agent:

“I was impeached,” Floss said. “I got pushed out the door because I asked to see all the finances.”

Those “finances,” Floss alleges, primarily involved two areas of CAR’s budget:CAR’s various entities – Floss said he was pushing for more detailed explanations for all CAR-owned entities, particularly the Northern Illinois Real Estate Information Network, or NIREIN, a for-profit referral and holding company that holds real estate licenses, and, Floss claims, that has no discernible paper trail in CAR’s records; and other for-profit entities, such as a for-profit MLS with no available information.CAR’s expenses and operating costs – as part of CAR’s recent merger discussions with the North Shore – Barrington Association of Realtors (NSBAR), Floss said he began taking a deeper look at CAR’s expenses, including the lease on its current headquarters, the various expense accounts and dinner charges of directors and staff members and, most notably, the salaries of CAR leadership, including CEO Ginger Downs.

Regarding CAR’s other entities, Floss told us they first came under question during CAR’s merger discussions with NSBAR, and he alleges that because NSBAR requested more information about those financials – and because CAR did not provide them – the merger fell through.

“They weren’t getting a true, crystal clear picture of our finances,” Floss said. “If there’s nothing wrong with the finances, what difference does it make? Just show them. All of them … Now the whole membership is suspicious.”

Instead of providing financials, CAR impeached President Floss. Then when one of its members who sat on the Finance Committee said that the CEO would not answer questions of the committee, and would not provide financial documents, CAR chose to sue that member rather than provide documentation.

That lawsuit settled with no admission of wrongdoing, and Ms. Geller said she was satisfied that there was no wrongdoing after discovery and looking at the books of the Association. I’ll take her word for it.

However, the refusal to disclose financials, to open the books, to answer questions, even to members of its own Finance Committee is… sadly not unusual.

Circling the Wagons

Second, as Sheriff Judd lays out, the Board of Directors supported Garula-Mers and froze out Webb who was President of EPCAR. As he put it, they “circled the wagons” around the CEO.

To say that this behavior is not at all unusual is to understate the case. More recently, I wrote about the absolute shitshow going on in San Diego Association of REALTORS. What I found the most appalling about the alleged wrongdoings is the actions and the lack of actions of the Board:

What enrages me more than anything else is the fact that this has been going on for, it appears, ten years. The SDAR Board of Directors (it is alleged) knew about the embezzlement, the illegal behavior and the abuses—and not only did nothing about that, but in fact helped Mercurio cover it up and punish the whistleblowers.

In response, instead of taking muscular action and coming clean, the SDAR Board has appointed a new CEO who issued a typical PR-spin piece of crap talking about confidential personnel information. As if that’s going to pass the smell test.

And not one Director, many of whom are named in the Complaint as active enablers of Mercurio’s wrongdoings, has resigned. Apparently, honor is a stranger to the SDAR Boardroom.

The rot goes very, very deep at SDAR. And it should serve as a wakeup call to the rest of the industry. Concrete steps need to be taken immediately.

Maybe not all Associations where shenanigans happen act like SDAR’s Board, who has acted more like a co-conspirator than a governing board exercising oversight. Allegedly. However, it is not at all unusual for Boards to rally around the CEO no matter what.

Which explains why two years after SDAR’s Board covered itself in suspicion, and I called for an immediate full financial audit of every REALTOR Association and MLS, EPCAR faces potential bankruptcy because its board “circled the wagons” around Ms. Garula-Mers.

Oh, by the way, SDAR forced out its new outsider CEO after a mere five months. The current President of SDAR, Chris Anderson, was deeply implicated in all of the activity by Mercurio. Numerous directors implicated in the Mercurio affair remain on the Board. Fox, henhouse.

We Have a Problem

I wish I could point to SDAR and the weirdness in Chicago as something super-rare. There are bad apples in every basket, after all, and even the best-run and best-managed industries can have bad actors taking advantage of them.

Sadly, such problems are not all that rare in organized real estate.

Literally as I was writing this post, news dropped yesterday (December 1st) about yet another (alleged) embezzlement problem:

The former executive officer of California’s Tuolumne County Association of Realtors (TCAR) was arrested and charged with 45 counts of embezzlement.

The Tuolumne County Sheriff’s Office arrested Shauna Marie Love at her home in Sonora on Nov. 25. The arrest followed a complaint filed against Love by the Tuolumne County District Attorney’s Office.

According to the complaint, the alleged embezzlement occurred from 2019 to 2024 when Love was the TCAR executive officer. The suspected embezzlement was first reported to law enforcement in June 2024 and the District Attorney’s Office became aware of the report in December 2024 and was still receiving further evidence and information as recently as October.

Ms. Love is alleged to have embezzled over $100,000 from a REALTOR Association with about 300 members. Ms. Garula-Mers is alleged to have embezzled between $20,000 and $100,000 from an Association with 100 members. One hundred members.

If only incidents stopped there. An intrepid reader (I have the best readers in the industry) was so outraged by the EPCAR story that s/he did research and compiled the following list of incidents (some of the links are broken):

What a sorry list this is. So many of the victims are tiny Associations, with 98 members in one case, who trusted the CEO… only to be taken advantage of. In some cases, the Association kind of deserved it as they were victimized multiple times. Even after getting burned, they did not put in financial controls or safeguards.

But in some cases, like SDAR and Summit Association of REALTORS and Triangle, these were and are very large Associations who got (allegedly in some cases, proven in others) taken to the cleaners.

There is a problem.

What organized real estate at every level, from the smallest 98-person Association to NAR itself, needs are two changes to happen immediately.

Operationally, it is clear and obvious that every single Association and MLS needs far stronger financial guardrails and controls. Trusting the staff to be honest has not proven to be a recipe for success. Sue Frank had led Summit REALTORS for TWENTY YEARS after all, while stealing from them. That is not “alleged” since Frank plead guilty and admitted to the theft.

At the same time, given the “circle the wagons” on the one hand and whatever the hell has allegedly going on in San Diego on the other hand, it isn’t obvious that trusting the Board to practice effective oversight is enough either.

Change must be made in financial controls, in legal approach, and in the culture of organized real estate.

Financial Changes

If I were advising an Association or MLS, I would recommend two immediate financial changes:

  1. Hire an accounting firm that does no other business for the Association or anyone connected to it to conduct an annual audit. So many of these crimes are caught during or after an audit. By conducting and publishing the results of an audit every year, the Association or MLS can stand tall knowing there are no shenanigans going on.
  2. Open the books to all members. Upon demand, any member in good standing of the Association or MLS may examine all of the financials or have experts audit the books. Refusal to cooperate should mean immediate automatic termination of the staff and automatic resignation of the entire Board of Directors.

Since so many victims are tiny Associations, NAR should pay for an accounting firm to conduct annual audits for any Association that cannot afford it. Lord knows NAR spends money on useless boondoggles; funnel some of that to preventing theft, fraud and embezzlement at the local Association level.

Closely related to paying for an audit, NAR and the state Associations should condition the charter of a local Association on a successful audit being filed each year. It seems like an incredibly reasonable demand to make sure the local organization is not being used as somebody’s personal piggy bank before it is allowed to be a REALTOR Association.

The second immediate change must be the willingness for members to sue individual directors on the Board for breach of fiduciary duty if and when these financial crimes are uncovered. We have no better example than the story that unravelled this whole mess: EPCAR.

RJ Webb, the President, who was facing resistance from the CEO and the Board, filed a lawsuit to “stop this conduct and to stop what he believed to be the theft of funds” as Sheriff Judd said at the press conference. I wish Webb had sued the Board members who “circled the wagons” for breach of fiduciary duty.

It is important that Directors understand that their job, their duty, is to govern the Association on behalf of the members. It is not to protect the CEO or any staffer or any Director. It is also important for REALTORS to realize that running for the Board is not a popularity contest, or just a feather in the cap. It is a position of immense responsibility that carries immense liability with it. Fiduciary duty of care requires financial oversight and failure to exercise that oversight should lead to personal liability for the director.

One does not have to be the President to bring a lawsuit. Any member can sue to demand that Directors live up to their fiduciary duty to provide oversight and controls over the Association’s finances. Yes, D&O insurance will cover that… unless there is intentional dishonesty, fraud, or criminal acts. Gross negligence—a willful blindness to the stealing going on—might also be a problem.

Back when I was writing about the goings-on at SDAR, a reader emailed me and asked, “What can I, just a little member, do?” The answer is, you can do a lot simply by talking to other members and demanding that your Board do its job… but ultimately, you can sue for breach of fiduciary duty.

Cultural Changes

Most importantly, I believe a wholesale cultural change needs to happen from top to bottom.

Boards of organized real estate have a culture of secrecy. There are nondisclosure agreements all over the place, often for no good reason except to enforce some kind of silence. Boards go into closed door “executive session” far too often, simply to avoid members finding out about a discussion or a contract. Associations far too often cite “confidential personnel issues” to avoid having to be transparent.

That culture is fertile ground for embezzlement, fraud, and theft. It is impossible to engage in embezzlement in the open; secrecy is necessary to commit that crime.

Any refusal by any staffer, including the CEO, to be forthcoming about finances should be grounds for termination and trigger an immediate forensic audit to see if a crime was committed. Any refusal to provide full and open access to the financials to a member, nevermind a director or a finance committee member, should result in the same. Any foot-dragging in providing financial information should automatically trigger an investigation.

Maybe Ginger Downs, the former CEO of Chicago REALTORS, did not engage in any malfeasance. But her refusal to provide full and detailed financial information is itself malfeasance. The culture of the Association and the MLS must change.

Secrecy and confidentiality must be banished and brought out only in the most extreme circumstances. Closed door executive sessions must be seen by everyone as justified only in extremis, and the person wanting secrecy had best justify its necessity to everyone loudly and clearly.

In its 3 year plan, NAR has loudly proclaimed that transparency is one of its most important goals. Prove it; open the books. Livestream leadership team meetings. Provide an example for all lower associations and MLSs to follow.

One of the most important cultural changes has to be re-thinking how the industry perceives those demanding transparency. People like RJ Webb and Bob Floss today are seen as “troublemakers” and frozen out, like the Association is a high school dominated by mean girls. Directors know not to make waves, not to demand financials, not to cause trouble lest they get isolated, alienated, and all around fucked with by the CEO and other directors. Members who demand answers are made into pariahs and persecuted, so the message becomes clear: keep quiet, don’t rock the boat, don’t make trouble.

Imagine if instead, the industry viewed those individuals as people who really care about the Association/MLS and want what’s best for it and its members? Imagine if those people are celebrated for giving a damn, instead of frozen out for making trouble. Imagine if demands for financials is not perceived as a challenge or a threat, but an opportunity to demonstrate just how clean the Association is, just how dedicated its staff is, just how professional and competent, and just how trustworthy.

You want members to trust you? Then act like you deserve their trust.

That’s a culture change.

Frankly, Associations are not the only ones who need to change the culture. MLS of course needs to embrace openness and transparency. But why not CMLS or RESO or any other organized real estate entity? NAHREP? AAREA? Women’s Council?

Change the culture of the industry from one of omerta to openness, from secrecy to transparency.

Miscellaneous Outtakes

Let me wrap up by noting a few miscellaneous details.

In multiple cases, the victimized Association was victimized multiple times. That suggests to me that the Association in question is simply too small and too poor to put financial controls into place. In that case, that Association should merge with the nearest larger Association and become a chapter. Honestly, if you can’t prevent theft and embezzlement, you really ought not to exist at all.

In at least one case, the CEO who was convicted of embezzlement… was previously convicted of embezzlement. Might I suggest that your employment screening process sucks if that happens?

Many of these cases involved theft or embezzlement over long periods of time; years and years in some cases. Clearly, open books policy and an annual audit would prevent that from happening. But the Board of Directors has to receive a lion’s share of the blame; where were y’all for years and years? It is actually difficult to imagine a more important function of the Board than financial oversight, and yet, that was the one thing these Boards failed at doing?

Finally, while the news stories cover the basic facts, and perhaps get into some of the background of audits, investigations, and discovery of the theft… they rarely get into the emotional impact on the Association, on its members, and on its volunteer leaders. The Lompoc story above did a bit:

“I was shocked,” Vass said. “She was basically a trusted friend, a trusted employee. It just kind of sent us reeling. It had happened before.”

“There was no reason to suspect anything was wrong.”

…

Vass said the case was personally painful for her.

“My mother was a Realtor in town and had passed away the year before. Jennifer donated $500 to her memorial fund, money for her kids, but it never happened. It was just a cover.”

“It broke my heart because my mom was so involved in the association. It just really hurt me personally.”

I imagine this story replayed itself dozens of times, hundreds of times across the country. I imagine RJ Webb is not crowing for “winning” since he won nothing; I imagine he’s as hurt as Vass was. The members of EPCAR are probably feeling the emotional trauma of such a betrayal.

Perhaps that is something for those who tend to “circle the wagons” should think about more. Preventing that hurt, that betrayal by someone you thought was a trusted friend might be worth a lot more transparency up front even if a bit uncomfortable. Maybe BS internal politics should take a backseat to preventing that emotional damage.

And it might start by openly talking about the fact that we have a problem in organized real estate. As the philosopher said, check yo self before you wreck yo self.

-rsh