An employee of an agency that assists people with mental disabilities has been charged with stealing a client’s money.

Mary Brue was in Washington County Court last week to face three counts. The 20 year employee of the Eastern Nebraska Office on mental retardation or ENCOR is accused of a scheme to skim money from a client’s checking account.

Brue's job was to assist the man who is mildly developmentally disabled live on his own. That included co-signing checks for a housekeeper once a week.

ENCOR Director Bob Brinker tells Channel 6 News, “The record we received showed the money was going to the housekeeper. When in fact sometimes it would go to the housekeeper and sometimes to her.”
It’s alleged that over an 18 month period the former ENCOR employee diverted $1260 from the client's account by co-signing checks written to her.

However she allegedly reported to ENCOR that the checks had gone to the housekeeper.

The scheme was discovered when a supervisor visited the client’s apartment and noticed it to be too messy for having a housekeeper once a week.

Brinker said the client’s family had opened a checking account years ago at a bank that didn’t provide canceled checks. So the agency didn’t have copies to verify where the money was going. ENCOR relied on the trust of the 20-year employee who submitted a ledger of expenses on a regular basis.

That checking account has been closed and a different ENCOR employee is assisting the client, a man about 50 years old who lives in Blair.

ENCOR Director Brinker said the client may be developmentally disabled but understands he’s a theft victim. Brinker said, “He was shocked about it and disappointed that somebody he trusted would do such an thing to him and he wants his money back."

Brue refused to comment leaving court. She waived a prelimiary hearing on two felonies and a misdemeanor. The charges include taking advantage of a vulnerable adult theft by deception and witness tampering. The arrest affidavit alleges Brue told the housekeeper to lie to ENCOR about how often she cleaned the client’s apartment.

For years the housekeeper had been cleaning it once a week but Brue allegedly had her there twice a month yet in records to ENCOR showed payments for once a week.