FORREST COUNTY – Cory Ferraez, a former Hattiesburg attorney with ties to Lowndes County, pleaded guilty Thursday to two misdemeanor embezzlement counts, resolving two criminal cases that have been pending since 2021.
Ferraez was indicted by a Forrest County grand jury in October 2021 on four felony counts of embezzlement involving clients at his former law firm. A second indictment accused him of embezzlement, obtaining signature with intent to defraud and fraud by mail or other means.
Special Judge Forrest Johnson, appointed by the Mississippi Supreme Court, accepted a plea agreement Thursday during a hearing live streamed by Hattiesburg Patriot News Media. Under the agreement, two of the felony counts were reduced to misdemeanors. Ferraez pleaded guilty to the misdemeanors, and the two remaining charges were dropped.
Johnson sentenced Ferraez to time served, crediting him for time spent in the custody of Forrest County Sheriff’s Office since Dec. 16.
“He’ll receive full credit for that,” Johnson said Thursday during the hearing. “He will be ordered to pay all … normal customary court costs and fees.”
The second embezzlement indictment also accused Jace Ferraez, Cory Ferraez’s twin brother, of conspiracy to obtain a signature with intent to defraud. Neither indictment will be prosecuted, according to the Forrest County Circuit Court’s Office.
Cory Ferraez failed to appear at a status conference in September 2025 regarding the embezzlement case because he was at an in-patient treatment center in Alabama. At the conference, he was ordered to turn himself in to authorities immediately on release, which he did Dec. 16.
Johnson noted Thursday’s hearing only resolves the two embezzlement indictments before the court, not other criminal or civil matters involving Cory Ferraez.
Cory Ferraez’s legal license was revoked in September 2025 following multiple allegations that he mishandled client fundings, including in the 2022 wrongful death settlement of Stephen Ray “Fuzzy” Weatherford. In that case, he is accused of failing to deliver the full $450,000 in settlement funds to the estate’s beneficiary, leading to separate legal proceedings. The case is still pending.
No additional payments have been made by Ferraez toward the total since August, according to Perry County Chancery Court records, leaving him with a balance of a little more than $48,000.
Cory Ferraez has a previous criminal history in Lowndes County. He received a six-month suspended jail sentence and paid a $200 fine after pleading guilty in 2018 in Lowndes County Circuit Court for voting illegally in a 2015 election, according to a press release by then-Attorney General Jim Hood.
The Mississippi Attorney General’s office confirmed to The Dispatch Ferraez had filed a motion for expungement, and there are no records related to the voter fraud conviction held by the Lowndes County circuit clerk’s office.
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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