ARLINGTON — An Arlington resident and business owner was sentenced to prison last month for willful failure to pay over taxes.

Deborah Ann Guenthner, 51, owned and operated WRG Electric, Inc., and Electrical Construction, Inc., both based in Arlington.

On July 15, she was sentenced to six months in prison, to be followed by six months of home electronic monitoring, by U.S. District Judge Ricardo Martinez in Seattle.

Guenthner will be placed on 36 months of supervised release following her release from custody and must pay restitution to the Internal Revenue Service in the amount of $377,687.50.

According to court documents, between October of 2004 and December of 2008, Guenthner withheld that exact amount from employee wages for Social Security, Medicare and federal income taxes as part of her normal responsibilities. However, she then failed to pay that money over to the federal government, and instead used those funds for her personal benefit and the benefit of the companies she owned.

The case was investigated by IRS Criminal Investigation and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Carl Blackstone.