Jurors acquit man of swindling $412K from St. Kate’s in plot with school’s onetime nursing dean

Jurors have acquitted a Twin Cities marketing professional of charges that he embezzled more than $400,000 from St. Catherine University as part of a plot with a woman who at the time was his girlfriend and dean of nursing at the school in St. Paul.

Juan Ramon Bruce, 57, of Shakopee spent 80 days in the Ramsey County jail in lieu of $100,000 bail until Monday, when jurors reached not guilty verdicts on all six counts of theft by swindle in connection with allegations that he and Laura Jean Fero stole the private school’s money from 2020 until last summer.

“He had done the work he was hired to do,” defense attorney Debra Hilstrom said Tuesday. “There was no crime committed here. And if there was one here, he didn’t commit it.”

Hilstrom said her client, who is no longer Fero’s boyfriend, “was very emotional, and he’s very thankful” upon hearing the verdicts in Ramsey County District Court.

Fero, 55, is still charged with identical counts that allege she siphoned about $412,000 through contracts the school had with Bruce’s JB & Associates. She remains free on a personal recognizance bond and is due back in court Aug. 13.

Fero moved to Florida, where she took over in August as dean of nursing for a university under AdventHealth, a private system of more than 20 hospitals and emergency rooms in the Orlando metropolitan area.

University spokeswoman Jennifer Audette told the Star Tribune on Wednesday that Fero “is no longer with the organization.” Audette declined to say when Fero left her post or under what circumstances.

Prosecutors alleged that Fero and Bruce used a St. Catherine procurement card to pay for airline tickets for them between June 2021 and August 2023 to Miami, Atlanta, Phoenix, Cancun and Orlando, along with paying for rental cars and lodging while in those cities.

According to the charges against Fero:

A university investigation found that Fero’s embezzlement involved contracts the school had with JB & Associates, a health care marketing and cost analysis business.

“Fero engaged in transferring significant funds to [JB & Associates] over multiple years while [its owner] provided little to no services to the university,” the charging document read.

Emails between Fero and Bruce show they had a romantic relationship throughout the time the school was doing business with his company. The school has a conflict of interest policy that would have forbidden such a relationship.

After Fero left St. Catherine’s, the school requested details from JB & Associates on the nature of its work. But the company submitted reports “that differed significantly from the reports he had previously sent to Fero directly while he was working for St. Catherine’s,” the charges noted.

Fero told police she didn’t believe the school’s conflict of interest policy applied, believing it only covered married couples. She also admitted to “editing” some of the documents JB & Associates submitted.