A prominent Butler County lawyer has been charged with stealing more than $460,000 from two estates he’d been hired to settle.

The Butler County detectives bureau on Monday charged Samuel Joseph “Joe” Brydon, 56, of Slippery Rock with theft by unlawful taking, theft by deception, theft by failure to make required disposition of funds and misapplication of entrusted property and property of government or financial institution.

Brydon, who will be arraigned today, faces a set of identical charges for each of the two estates he stands accused of victimizing: John N. Davis of Slippery Rock, and Anita Cratty of Slippery Rock Township.

Reports of missing money first surfaced in January, when Butler County Judge S. Michael Yeager alerted the county district attorney’s office about what he termed “an improper disposition of the funds” in the Davis estate.

Eagle obituary records indicate Davis, a former part owner of Wholesale Plumbing and Heating Supply, Butler, died Oct. 14, 2007, at age 93.

Court records indicate Davis’ $1 million estate was supposed to be divided equally between his daughter, Sally Davis of Euclid, Ohio, and his son, John A. Davis of Slippery Rock.

The son, having been named executor to the estate, hired Brydon to do the legal work, according to the court records.

As part of the process, four checks totaling $368,389 were transferred from the Davis estate to Brydon’s Interest On Lawyers Trust Account, which is an escrow account for lawyers commonly called an IOLTA account.

During the next several years no action was taken on the estate and attempts to get the money back from Brydon were fruitless, according to court records. The estate hired a new lawyer who last fall took the estate’s complaint about Brydon to Yeager.

Court records say Brydon, during a Dec. 8 court hearing, told the judge that the Davis estate’s money still was in his IOLTA account, and that he would transfer it back to the estate later that month.

But Brydon missed the deadline to transfer the money. And in January, Brydon’s lawyer Michael Jewart of Butler told the judge that his client does not have the Davis estate’s money in his IOLTA account.

Court records say Butler County detective Charles Barger later searched Brydon’s bank account records and verified the significant deposits to Brydon’s IOLTA account from the Davis estate.

But, according to the affidavit of probable cause written by Barger, “Over the ensuing years, the account steadily decreases to the point that on Dec. 30, 2011, there is a balance of $926.56. There is no record of any funds being returned to the estate.”

The court record says Barger tried to set up meetings with Brydon to talk about this matter, but Jewart canceled the meetings.

Court records do not indicate how investigators became aware of the Cratty estate.

Cratty, a widow and former school teacher, died May 18, 2010, at age 90, according to Eagle obituary records.

Court records state that Cratty’s estate was willed to be equally divided between her daughter-in-law, Kathy Cratty, now deceased, and her three daughters, Gayle Crawford of Clintonville, Kay Ellen McDonald of Utah, and Vauna Walker of Idaho.

According to the affidavit in that case, which also is written by Barger, Cratty’s estate consisted of her home, about $800 from a Pennsylvania Education Retirement and several hundred dollars from an insurance policy.

Five months after Cratty’s death, court records say, her home was sold, and Brydon was tasked to put the $95,000 proceeds in a trust account.

The affidavit goes on to say that the heirs still have not received their money, yet none of Brydon’s accounts contains the money from the Cratty estate.

Brydon faces a preliminary hearing on both cases March 21 in the Slippery Rock office of District Judge Tim Shaffer.

Jewart, who will represent Brydon, declined to comment Monday.

Brydon, according to court records, was admitted to practice law in 1982 after receiving his bachelor’s degree from Slippery Rock University and his law degree from Duquesne University.

He has been a former county detective, a probation officer and a part-time district attorney for domestic relations.

He also is the nephew of former Butler County Judge John Brydon, who died last summer.

And, until these allegations came to light, Brydon had been the county’s juvenile court master for more than a decade.

A juvenile court master is an attorney who is appointed by the president judge to conduct hearings in juvenile delinquency and dependency matters. The master makes recommendations to a judge.

Delinquency cases involve youths 10 to 18 years old accused of committing a crime for which they could go to jail if they were an adult. Dependency court relates to cases about other matters involving juveniles including abuse, neglect, truancy and termination of parental rights.

According to records at the controller’s office, the juvenile court master is paid $90 an hour, and Brydon billed the county for $111,130 in 2011.

The courts appointed a different lawyer to take over these duties, beginning in January.

The Pennsylvania state Supreme Court’s Internet site as of Monday lists Brydon’s law license as active and in good order. However, court records indicate that multiple people, including Yeager, already have contacted the state’s Disciplinary Board about these matters.

First Assistant District Attorney Patricia McLean refused to talk about the specifics of the cases against Brydon.

However, she said officials in her office determined there is nothing in Brydon’s background that would cause the district attorney’s office to ask a different agency to pursue the prosecution.

“There’s no conflict of interest here,” McLean said.