Couple’s Wedding Decorator Allegedly Steals Envelope Box Filled with $10K in Cash Gifts During Reception, Then Disappears By Kimberlee Speakman

A couple’s wedding day ended on a sour note when they found their donation box had gone missing.

The couple, Paul and Sherida McCallum, alleged to WSB-TV that the wedding decorator they hired for the wedding reception, Kendarries Powell, walked out with the donations, which they estimated at $10,000, that were going to be put toward their honeymoon.

“To end on such a negative note, it broke everyone’s heart. It didn’t just affect my husband and I. It affected the entire family,” Sherida told the outlet.

She noted that they hired Powell after hearing several good reviews about him from loved ones, saying, “When you’re planning a wedding, you want word of mouth, someone you can depend on.”

However, the couple claimed to the outlet that they got the opposite of someone dependable. During their reception after their September 2024 wedding ceremony in midtown Atlanta, they said they began to hear complaints about the decorator.

“He’s by the bar, and he’s not acting professionally. He’s drinking all the alcohol. He’s intoxicated. I want him to leave,” Paul told WSB-TV, adding that despite this, he allowed the decorator to stay at the reception.

He said that he didn’t realize what kind of mistake that was until he and his new wife realized that the donation box they had set up for family and friends to contribute money to their honeymoon fund was missing. 

The couple said they returned to the event hall the day after the wedding and reviewed the security footage to figure out where it went. They claim to WSB-TV that they saw Powell bring a tablecloth into the wedding reception hall and walk out of the venue with the donation box partially wrapped inside.

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“And when I saw the camera spot that box, the hair on my skin went up,” Paul recalled. “You can tell when someone is suspicious. He looked around very quickly to see what was going on.”

Paul told WSB-TV that they attempted to persuade Powell to return the box, allegedly saying, “I spoke to him and said, ‘Hey, be a man. Let’s meet at the station and talk about it.’ He refused. He never showed up.”  

Since then, the couple claims that the wedding decorator disappeared. They filed a criminal complaint with the Atlanta Police Department and said that a detective told them that an arrest warrant was issued for Powell.

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The Atlanta Police Department confirmed to PEOPLE that Powell was arrested on Nov. 19, 2024, on an “outstanding warrant for theft by taking related to this incident.”

As for Paul and Sherida, they were able to go on their honeymoon anyway, even without the missing money. Despite the negative wedding reception experience, the couple said they have tried to move on and stay positive. 

“We want to focus on the good memory of our wedding,” Paul told WSB-TV. “We don’t want this to take away from the hard work we put in.”