SAN DIEGO, Calif. — The widow of a late California accountant, who’s accused of embezzling millions of dollars from an elderly client, says her husband concealed his alleged crimes from her and took money from his own relatives before he died.
The allegations are being made against Richard Muscio, who hosted the “It’s Your Money and Your Life” radio show in San Diego from 2011-2018.
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“If you look at everything that’s been hidden for so long, it makes sense Richard was a master at hiding things,” Mari Muscio, Richard’s widow, told Team 10 Investigative Reporter Austin Grabish during a recent phone interview.
Mari is accused in a civil lawsuit of personally pocketing hundreds of thousands of dollars by taking part in an “unconscionable conspiracy to defraud” Mary Blume, who hired Richard to manage a trust account and do her taxes.
In a court filing, Mari denied the accusations. Richard died after a battle with cancer in 2024.
‘This is not what it seems’
“She had trusted him and she was shocked,” said Steven Blume, Mary’s nephew, during a sit-down interview with Team 10.
Steven, who is suing Richard’s estate and Mari for breach of fiduciary duty and financial elder abuse, alleges in a court filing that the well-known CPA siphoned over $4.8 million dollars from Mary Blume’s trust over several years.
“I started digging into each of the assets and finding, ‘Oh, this is not what it seems,’” he said.
After Richard died, Steven became the trustee for his aunt’s account and decided to pay a visit to City National Bank in Solana Beach, where her money was kept.
‘Sham’ loans, luxury car payments
At the bank, Steven claims he discovered his aunt’s trust only had $3,266 in cash left and found a secret bank account Richard had set up without her knowledge.
He said the trust, which Mary put money in from 2003 to 2011, had only one remaining asset — a bungalow in Encinitas purchased for $465,000 in 2013.
But according to the lawsuit, after Richard bought the home in his capacity as trustee, he used the trust to enter “sham loan transactions” that caused the fund to take on hundreds of thousands of dollars in loans at “outrageous interest rates.”
“There was no reason to mortgage the property. The trust should have had millions of dollars in cash, and it was set up to invest in things. It wasn't set up to take on debt,” Steven said.
In court documents, Steven alleges his aunt’s money paid for Richard’s credit cards, BMW and Mercedes leases and personal mortgages.
‘I don’t commit fraud’
After paying a visit to the property on Teaberry Street in Encinitas, Steven alleges he discovered Richard’s son was living there.
According to his lawsuit, Richard’s son paid some rent to the trust, but “this was a sham, as the rent money was just transferred right back out of the trust accounts to [Richard] Muscio and/or his family members.”
Team 10 reviewed hundreds of copies of checks from the Mary Blume trust that show large payments were made payable to Richard and members of his family.
Steven alleges in the lawsuit that Richard used the trust to fund his wife’s acting career and make payments to businesses owned or affiliated with her.
Several checks Team 10 reviewed, which appear to have been signed by Richard, including ones for $100,000 and $25,000 that were made out to Mari Muscio, appear to have her name endorsed on the back.
Asked about the checks, Mari said she was unaware of them, as were her business partner and children.
“I guess he would put them in an account and not tell me,” she said.
Mari, who lives in Carlsbad, said her late husband handled the couple’s finances. “My husband did all of the banking, all of it probably, 98% of it,” she said during her interview with Team 10.
The widow compared herself to Ruth Madoff, the wife of criminal mastermind Bernie Madoff, who claimed she was stunned to learn her husband had pulled off the largest known Ponzi scheme in history.
“I don’t embezzle. I don’t commit fraud,” she said.
Mari claimed two days before her husband died, his mother, sister and brother told her the CPA had taken their money.
“They were shocked too,” she said.
Mari told Team 10 there are 50-100 people who are affected. When we pressed her to elaborate on what she meant, she said the list includes clients but declined to share further details.
“I’m just giving you too much information,” she said, adding her lawyers told her not to speak with us.
Mari said her husband, who was known for raising money for charities and starting the Oceanside Turkey Trot, lied about his criminal past and left forged documents behind in boxes.
“I had no idea because he was doing all these great things and people loved him and one guy, one client, called him a prince.”
Asked if she believes the paperwork unequivocally shows her husband defrauded people, she said, “Yeah, he was doing things that were.”
A hidden criminal past
Court records reviewed by Team 10 show Richard pleaded guilty in 2003 to a felony for conspiring to defraud the United States by filing false tax documents that understated a client’s income.
A judge sentenced the accountant to three years of probation and ordered him to pay a $10,000 fine. The state then suspended his accountancy license for two years.
Team 10 has also learned after the conviction, the IRS put restrictions on Richard’s ability to represent clients until 2017. Those limitations were in place while Richard hosted his financial radio show.
In a recorded interview in May 2024, Mary told private investigator Jon Perkins she never gave Richard, his wife or his children permission to use her trust money for personal expenses.
Perkins, a retired lieutenant who investigated major fraud cases and murders during his career spanning over three decades in Los Angeles County, told Team 10 he thought the evidence he reviewed was a “slam dunk.”
But the investigator said he approached multiple law enforcement agencies and no one wanted to take the case.
“One different entity said, ‘Well, what do you want me to do, dig him up and file charges on him?’ I thought, come on.”
He said the heart of the evidence is in the financial paper trail Richard left behind.
“People need to be held accountable. All those monies are gone.”
In a statement, the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office told Team 10 no formal case or investigation involving Richard Muscio or any of his family members was ever submitted to the DA’s office by law enforcement for review.
Widow files for bankruptcy
Mari, who initially told us she would come to our studio to talk, backed out of the sit-down interview and eventually stopped responding to emails.
Court records show she filed for bankruptcy earlier this year listing $15.4 million in debt against $452,000 in assets.
On the list of creditors is Steven, who’s owed a disputed $12 million for Mary Blume’s trust.
She told Team 10 during our phone call that she was considering taking a lie detector test and will continue to maintain her innocence.
“I would go to that man face to face and he could look me in the eye and I could tell him to his face I did not know.”
Comparing herself to Madoff’s wife, she said she plans to start a podcast and write a book in the future.
“It’s shocking what has taken place and I do have a lot to say about probably the 50-100 people that didn’t know.”
As for Steven, he said he’ll never forget when he broke the news to his aunt that almost all of her money in the trust was gone.
“It's one of the most distressing moments of my life having to tell her that this happened.”
Mary Blume was 93 and passed away in July 2025.
Steven hopes by sharing his story, others will take a closer look at their financial accounts.
“This can happen to anybody. Okay? You've got to be really careful on who you appoint for the trustee and you've got to have oversight.”
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