Pastor’s ex-wife facing charges after church funds misused

CRYSTAL RIVER, Fla. — The former wife of a Crystal River church pastor has been arrested and is facing charges of misusing church funds.

According to the Citrus County Sheriff’s Office, Nancy Bertine was arrested on July 24 and charged with a scheme to defraud and grand theft of $100,000 or more.

Church officials at Gulf to Lake Church told detectives that multiple fraudulent transactions had taken place on Amazon on a church credit card.

Church officials said Nancy Bertine, 74, had been a church employee but left the position and the church after she and Lloyd Bertine, senior lead pastor, got a divorce.

When church staff and the finance director started reviewing documents, statements and invoices to be paid, they began to notice several hundred fraudulent purchases that had been made on the suspect’s personal Amazon account, which was installed and open on the suspect’s desktop computer in her office.

Staff began recalling times where they had previously questioned the suspect about “suspicious” purchases, and the suspect would reply and tell them, “Don’t worry about it, go ahead and pay for it.” Since the suspect was the pastor’s wife, staff members and finance personnel didn’t question her authority or position at the church and accepted her response and processed the payments for the aforementioned fraudulent Amazon purchases.

The investigation revealed fraudulent purchases from 2022 to 2024 totaling approximately $37,000. Sheriff’s office records indicated purchases for dog food, cat food, personal hygiene products, cosmetics, clothing items, hair dye, lingerie, personal women’s undergarments.

The case remains open and is still under investigation.