A Norfolk woman has been arrested after allegedly stealing money from two foreign exchange students living with her.
Fayette Klug, 34, of 209 Boxelder St., was arrested late Friday morning and booked at the Madison County Jail on suspicion of theft by deception, a Class III felony.
The two victims - one foreign exchange student from China and the other from Norway, both of whom were attending Battle Creek High School - told law enforcement that Klug took cash from them and used their credit cards.
The amount taken between both girls totaled more than $10,000, according to a probable cause affidavit written by Investigator Mike Bowersox of the Madison County Sheriff's Office.
The girls also told Bowersox that they were locked in the basement apartment area that they shared. At the time, Klug told them it was an accident - that the door was broken.
Both students were removed from the Klug residence earlier this week.
Why Klug was even hosting foreign exchange students has become a point of investigation because she is a convicted felon.
Bowersox said that the foreign exchange placement service ran a standard criminal history check and the database turned up no convictions on Klug.
"Someone dropped the ball. It just didn't get in there somehow," Bowersox said.
Madison County Attorney Joe Smith said neither his office - nor law enforcement - received an official complaint about the theft.
"This is a case that makes everybody angry and law enforcement was the last to know about it," Smith said. "It's not a case that we sat on; it's a case that was never reported."
Smith first was contacted by a concerned citizen Tuesday night.
On Wednesday, he contacted the school and the foreign exchange placement service. The company made full restitution to the girls on Thursday and have been extremely cooperative in the investigation, Bowersox and Smith said.
The investigation into Klug is ongoing, Bowersox said, as there may be additional foreign exchange students who may have been victimized by Klug.
Klug is currently being held in the Madison County Jail on $150,000 or 10 percent bond.
"In interviewing those girls over in Battle Creek, I apologized," Bowersox said. "I said, 'This is not how people from Nebraska or Americans act; 99.9 percent of Americans are decent; you got stuck with a bad one.' "
Reader Comments
Posted: Thursday, October 08, 2009
Article comment by:
Web Development
Dave,
Past stories remain on the Daily News Web site. With the updated site, readers are able to comment on past stories as well as new ones, but when a new comment is left, it slips up into the "Recently Commented Articles" section of the site.
So, it's not that the Daily News is re-running old news. It's that someone left a new comment on a story published last year, bringing it back into "Recently Commented" section.
Thanks for being a faithful (and observant) reader.
Posted: Thursday, October 08, 2009
Article comment by:
Dave haney
why are we running old news over again???.or did i read something wrong.
Posted: Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Article comment by:
audelia najera
i think its a whole bunch of bull i think she is inosent until proven guilty i dont even think shes guilty i give all my love to fayette klug and her family!!!!!
Posted: Friday, October 17, 2008
Article comment by:
Janice Howell
Last year Fayette Klug was our supervisor with our foreign exchange student from Brazil. From the first, she was telling differing stories to our student then to us, saying she never said the things she said. Our student would get off the phone crying, saying Fayette was going to send her back to Brazil. Our student had done nothing wrong and we couldn't understand what was going on. Finally toward the end, our student left us for another family and Fayette spread all kinds of vicious lies about us to our friends and my employer, causing stress in my workplace. We had purchased plane tickets for our student to go with us on a trip and when she left, she owed us money for them. We told our student she could pay us directly, but Fayette wanted her to pay HER and she (Fayette) would pay us. When we foiled that plan by talking directly to the parents, Fayette tried another tactic to throw a wrench in us getting our money back: she told our student's new family that the flights had been cancelled and our student didn't owe any money to us at all. We were able to prove that was a lie by contacting our travel agent. We tried to contact Fayette, but she wouldn't return our calls. We tried getting justice from Fayette's supervisor, but he just said he found nothing from his "investigation" and wasn't going to pursue it any further. I'm glad eyes have finally been opened to what she really is. I hope she gets prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Posted: Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Article comment by:
Ryan Lee
I am one of the exchange students in this year 08/09, I am from Denmark and also one of the person she cheated. The way she do is incredible nasty... I would say, because she started to buy some cloths to another exchange students little sister which is a baby, that I live with and she explained how it was to be an exchange student and her experience and tried to help us so much with everything. After staying in a hotel for one day she said that the other exchange student and I should pay her $100 for the gas + hotel + food that wasn't the problem yet. The thing is she wasn't the person that paid for those things, it was another family and she was supposed to give all the money to them as she told us .... but instead she only gave the half. After a while the family said that we still needed to pay 50 each and we were so confused, and we contacted Fayette and she said that she will talk with the family about it and that we already paid them. I could never imagine that she was lying in front of everybody and act like nothing. After I had contact with the family and they said that Fayette said I will try to make them pay the $50 that they still need. My thoughts about her when I knew she was arrested, I was really surprised when I heard it, of course I didn't knew about the $50 yet. But when everything was clear, so the first thing I thought was never trust american people, but I also knew inside that there is good and evil. But the thing is now I lost a lot of confidence to STS Foundation and I am very disappointed of them. Thats all I want to say. P.S. Never trust the person called Fayette Klug !
