embezzlement Meaning, Definition & Usage

noun the fraudulent appropriation of funds or property entrusted to your care but actually owned by someone else
peculation; defalcation; misappropriation; misapplication.

The fraudulent appropriation of property by a person to whom it has been intrusted; as, the embezzlement by a clerk of his employer's; embezzlement of public funds by the public officer having them in charge. ✍ Larceny denotes a taking, by fraud or stealth, from another's possession; embezzlement denotes an appropriation, by fraud or stealth, of property already in the wrongdoer's possession. In England and in most of the United States embezzlement is made indictable by statute.