The director of financial aid for North Idaho College has been arrested in the wake of an investigation begun after a Craigslist.com post was discovered that offered NIC grant money to students in exchange for sexual favors.

Joseph Bekken, 36, was arrested Wednesday by Coeur d'Alene Police detectives for five felony charges, including attempted misuse of public funds, attempted procurement of prostitution, burglary, bribery and using a computer in a scheme to defraud.

He is currently in custody at the Kootenai County Public Safety Building.

It started with a post in the "Casual Encounters" section of Craigslist. "Hello, I have a proposition for NIC students. Email me and we can discuss," followed by three common acronyms indicating the poster was looking for sex.

Spokane Police originally found the post, forwarded it onto the FBI, who got in touch with Coeur d'Alene Police.

Police worked with NIC administration to set up a fake student account and set up an email address. An officer began emailing the poster of the ad, pretending to be a female student.

During their correspondence, Bekken awarded $587 of NIC grant money into the fake student's account. Police arranged a meet up, still pretending to be the female student.

"This director was using his influence and his position to misuse these funds in exchange for a personal sex act," explained Chief Lee White.

On February 2, the day of the meet-up, Bekken showed up to the location of the fake student's apartment, and so did police.

"He was taken in and detained," Chief Lee explained. "He was brought back here and asked questions.

Ultimately he was released until we could conduct some further investigation and do some computer forensic work and things of that nature."

Bekken admitted he's been posting ads like this for several semesters, but said he's never had any sexual encounters for money before.

"As far as we know, there's just one student so far," Chief White said. "We're hoping other people who may have been involved in this may come forward so we can speak to them about this."

In an emailed statement to the media, NIC president Joe Dunlap confirmed Bekken was no longer an employee of the college; Bekken's bio had been scrubbed from the college's website as of Wednesday afternoon.

“The individual charged in this case is no longer an employee of the college and has not been since the issue first came to light. North Idaho College has worked alongside law enforcement from the very beginning of the investigation. I am grateful for the knowledge and training of our staff, which resulted in a swift and decisive response to this incident. Communication throughout this process has been greatly enhanced by the work of NIC’s school resource officer, who serves both NIC and the Coeur d’Alene Police Department. In addition, our institution’s emphasis on compliance with Title IX training requirements for all employees has resulted in a heightened awareness on reporting incidents within the college. All of these factors helped NIC respond to this situation promptly and proactively.,” Dunlap wrote.

Prior to coming to Coeur d'Alene, Bekken was the director of Finance Counseling for Grand Canyon University, where he previously served as manager of that university's financial aid office.