She’s been ordered to pay more than $3,200 to victims who each donated anywhere from $15 to $400 online or at benefits held in her honor.
The community rallied to raise money for the mother of four’s medical expenses after Gaus allegedly told people in 2013 that she had brain cancer. A youcaring.com page brought in more than $1,000.
Area businesses donated items worth hundreds of dollar for an event hosted by the Fraternal Order of Eagles in Woodstock.
Dozens of T-shirts were sold around Champaign County and one family purchased four Build-a-Bear toys for Gaus to record messages for her children to have after she died.
Investigators couldn’t track down or verify every person who made cash donations, Champaign County Prosecutor Kevin Talebi said, so there were likely more victims.
Polly Hawk of Mechanicsburg, a former neighbor of Gaus, was one of the people who donated on youcaring.com. She said she feels horrible for the community that got duped, but mostly for Gaus’s children.
“I am not sure how they are going to recover from this,” she said.
Champaign County Judge Nick Selvaggio also cited the psychological effects this hoax had on her children in his comments during sentencing.
In his journal entry on the sentencing, Selvaggio wrote that he imposed the maximum sentence due to, “the breadth of deception, the longevity of the deception, and the immediate and prolonging psychological effect of the deception on the defendant’s four children.”
He also noted that Gaus showed no genuine remorse for her lies and had demonstrated a pattern of deception by previously telling her ex-husband she suffered from multiple sclerosis and thyroid cancer.
She disputed those claims, but Selvaggio said she, “engaged in a pattern of deception over a significant period of time without regard to the emotional trauma suffered by her most intimate circle of close friends and immediate family members.”
The prosecutor agreed.
“The real tragedy is what she did to her family and her children in letting them believe that she was going to die,” Talebi said.
The Champaign County community is generous and will continue to be, Talebi said.
“I certainly hope people are not deterred from giving,” after this incident, he said.
Hawk, who has several close friends who are battling cancer, said she will continue to help everyone she can, but may be more wary in the future.
“I knew way before she got charged that she didn’t have cancer … the things just weren’t adding up,” she said. “I personally will make sure that I know the circumstances before I donate now.”
Gaus was in the Tri-County Regional Jail on Wednesday awaiting transport to the Ohio Reformatory for Women.
Her lawyer asked Selvaggio to delay the start of her sentence pending an appeal, but the judge denied that request.
She can make the same request to the appeals court, Talebi said, but is in custody pending that decision.
About the Author