Issue date: 8/28/08 Section: News

Kirksville's square has undergone a fishy transition.

Kitigawa, the sushi restaurant that opened last spring, served its last plate earlier this summer. Former operators Kimberlee Smock and Alexander E. Brooks recently were arrested in Surprise, Ariz., for fraud.

Seven victims of fraud have come forward to the Adair County police, but Detective Justin Jones of the Kirksville Police Department said he thinks more victims will come forward still.

Smock has been charged with passing a bad check, and Brooks is charged with felony stealing, both in Adair County. Jones, who currently is heading the investigation, said the warrant for their arrest was issued in June when they left Kirksville, although Brooks' original charge was issued in 2007.

"Our investigation goes back to when they first came to Kirksville," Jones said.

Jones said Brooks and Smock did not actually own the name Kitigawa. Smock additionally filed for a license through the Missouri Department of Revenue for a corporation called Modern Foods.

Smock also went by alternate names. Jones said local customers and business owners knew him as Mike Smock and others knew him as Mike Fukuda.

Jones said neither the owners of the restaurant nor the owner of the building have anything to do with the fraud charges, but both came forward as victims. More details might become available as the investigation continues, he said.

Whitney Rentals president Larry Whitney, who owns the building where the former sushi restaurant was located, said Smock was the tenant for the building and that her lease expired at the end of June. Whitney said that days after the lease expired, Brooks and Smock left and that he doesn't expect them back.

"I've had people the past couple of days cleaning it," he said. "As soon as we see what happens and we hear from the court or we hear from them, then we'll know what to do with the building."

He said he hopes to get a business back in the building soon, but he doesn't know whether or not it will be another sushi place.

"The people I talked to that ate there said the food was good," he said. "Sushi restaurants are catching on all over the country big time. I think the town and the University could support a sushi restaurant. But I'm open for anything that wants to go in there."

Brooks and Smock are being held in Arizona on $25,000 and $850 bonds. Jones said their extradition hearing to challenge the warrant to return to Adair County is expected to take place at the end of this month.

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