Stolen Checks

I have learned more than I ever wanted to know about what to do when one's checks are stolen. My son's house near Renston, North Carolina, was burglarized on the 21^st of June, 2001. In addition to ransacking the house and stealing over $1,000 worth of audio/video equipment, his blank checks were stolen. The deputy who cam to investigate seemed not to take it seriously. My son told the deputy about the blank checks and gave him a paper with his name written on it. The following day, the 22^nd of June, I called up the Pitt County Sheriff's department to give them the serial number and other details on the laptop computer which was also stolen during this incident. After 15 minutes I still had not contacted the appropriate person - I was repeatedly told to dial this or that number, only to get no answer, a person who said it was not his job, or a fax machine. Finally the phone receptionist took a message. I also sent the information to the Sheriff's Office by mail. That morning my son went to the credit union to report the problem to them. They were very good with him, closing his accounts, setting up new accounts, getting him new checks, and putting a stop payment on all checks from the old account, all this at no cost to my son. They asked him to get a copy of the police report.

Not long after the burglary, the mail about returned checks started to appear, $5,000 worth on the first day alone. My son called the Sheriff's office to tell them about this. He told me that they did not seem much interested in it. When my son did get a copy of the police report, he discovered that the report did not include his name (only his roommate's name) and made no mention of the stolen checks. By this time he was getting threatening phone calls from merchants who had been foolish enough to cash his checks without any identification. The Wal-Mart in Morehead City, North Carolina, called him every day, threatening him with prosecution, while he was waiting to receive an amended police report. Finally he stopped that harassment by canceling his telephone service. Wal Mart's goal seems to be to further victimize the victim of a burglary. My son wonders why they consider him to be culpable for their having accepted a stolen check with no identification.

On the 7^th of July, 2001, my son's house was burglarized again. Fortunately he had removed his new checks and brought them over to my house. The deputy who responded this time ("Scooter") was delightfully professional, dusting for prints, explaining to my son what he needed to do to straighten this all out, etc. This was the same officer who had investigated an earlier burglar at my son's previous residence in Rountree, NC, just up the road from Renston. In that incident my son and friends actually caught the burglars on the premises. The deputy suggested that my son drive down to Morehead City and visit the police there, insisting that they assign an investigator to the case so they can go out to the Wal Mart and pull their surveillance tapes (to try to identify who is cashing these checks) etc.

A friend told me that check burglars around here use the Wal Mart and the Winn Dixie to convert their stolen checks into cash, since these merchants have lax check cashing policies, allowing crooks to use checks in amounts of a few hundred dollars with a small grocery order, receiving the balance in cash. I guess my friend was right, because my son started getting mail from Winn Dixie's collection agency and threatening phone calls from Wal-Mart while he still had no proper police report. The crooks had started cashing the checks already on the 22^nd of June, the day after the burglary. Winn Dixie's agency told him that they had reported him to the SCAN agency (listed below). Too bad that Winn Dixie did not check the SCAN agency prior to cashing these bad checks -- recall that my son had reported the stolen checks to the credit union early on the morning of the 22^nd (and had notified them by e-mail the evening before), so the check verification agencies should have already been notified that checks drawn on my son's compromised account were stolen checks.

In addition to notifying the bank and the police about the problem, and being sure that they take appropriate actions, it might be a good idea to notify check verification agencies yourself. Here is a list of such agencies:

National Check Fraud Service: 1-843-571-2143
SCAN: 1-800-262-7771
TeleCheck: 1-800-710-9898 or 927-0188
CrossCheck: 1-707-586-0551
Equifax Check Systems: 1-800-437-5120
International Check Services: 1-800-526-5380

My son was finally able to get a proper police report from the Sheriff's office, after over three weeks, several letters and phone calls, and his landlord going down to the Sheriff's office and asking them to take the case more seriously. With that document in hand, he was able to start swearing out affidavits of forgery. For every check that was forged, he needs to swear out such an affidavit, have it notarized, and send it to the firm that was foolish enough to accept the forged check. Our credit union has been quite helpful with respect to preparing these affidavits and notarizing them, at no charge to my son. Nevertheless, it is a lot of hassle for him.

Some merchants have been much more consumer friendly than have others with their response to having accepted a forged check. Kudos to K Mart, which had the most friendly response (see below).

Here is a brief description of the actions taken by merchants who accepted checks forged on my son's account. Please keep in mind that in every case the check had been returned to the merchant along with notification that the check had been stolen and forged, so these merchants knew that my son was the victim.

• Abrams Barbecue Restaurant: Demanded payment through their agent, Security Check.
• Dollar General Stores: Sixteen months after the forgery, hired Automated Collection Services of Nashville, TN, to harass the victim, demanding payment for the forged check. Dollar General never made any attempt to contact my son about the forged check. We sent mail to the collection agency and email to both the collection agency and the corporate office of Dollar General. To their credit, Dollar General responded within just a few days and said that the collection agency had closed the case and would not be bothering us any more.
• Equifax Retail Solutions: Requested an affidavit of forgery. Acknowledged receipt of the affidavit and apologized for any inconvenience.
• Food Lion: Acknowledged that the checks were stolen, provided copies of both sides of the forged checks, and requested an affidavit of forgery. This was one of the more friendly responses.
• Golden Corral of Virginia Beach: Their agent, Checkcare Systems, sent a letter acknowledging that the check had been stolen/forged, but demanded payment nonetheless. Later they requested a lengthy affidavit, a copy of photo identification, and a copy of the police report. All this for a check of $47.28. Two weeks after my son had mailed them all of these documents, they mailed to him another demand for payment and a threat to take legal action against him. I emailed the contact address given on the web for Checkcare systems, lori_renfroe@checkcare.com. I provided details of the problem and asked that she advise the Virginia Beach unit to stop harassing my son, The only reply I ever received was the autoreply indicated that my email had been opened.
• K & W Cafeteria of Greenville, NC: Their agent, A & J Services, threatened legal action if payment was not made within three business days from the date of receipt of their threatening letter.
• K Mart: Sent my son a letter advising him that they understood he was not responsible for the forgery, expressing their sympathy for his loss, advising him that his account number had been reported to check verification services to help prevent additional fraud on that account, and offering to help him further if he had problems cashing checks at the K Mart. This was the most friendly of responses.
• Mc Call's Bar-B-Cue & Seafood: This one takes the cake for unreasonable action. Without ever contacting my son, not even a letter or a phone call, the proprietor of this firm swore out a worthless check complaint against my son. As I write this on the 27^th of January, 2002, seven months after the burglary, the sheriff's deputies are looking for my son regarding this matter.
• The Pantry: Demanded payment through their agent, Security Check. Despite the fact that Security Check was provided with an affidavit of forgery and the details of the burglary and the stolen checks, they turned the case over to the Law Offices of Bennett & DeLoney, who demanded payment of $295.90 to cover two checks that were written for a total of $39.90, and threatened to sue if payment was not presented. Despite being advised of the burglary and forgery, and being provided with an affidavit of forgery and a copy of the police report, Bennett & DeLoney has continued demanding payment and threatening legal action, most recently a full 17 months after the burglary. Each of several telephone calls placed to the number given on their correspondence resulted in hearing a recording advising that the call could not be completed. Correspondence to the legal department of The Pantry never produced any reply.
• Staples: Demanded payment. After having received an affidavit of forgery, they wrote and threatened to ruin my son's credit rating if he did not reimburse them for the forged check. When I used Alta Vista's search engine to find information on their agent, International Check Services, Inc., the first hit returned identified that firm as being a check verification agency for casinos. Hmmmm, what does that imply about Staples? When I found a Staples web page that permitted the posting of queries, I posted a complaint and a copy of the letter that my son had earlier sent to International Check Services along with the affidavit. I received an email response noting that my complaint had been forwarded to the Customer Relations Specialists in the Escalated Complaints department within Staples Corporate.
Neither I nor my son received any further contact from them after that.
• Wal Mart of New Bern, NC: The main office sent a letter acknowledging that the check was stolen and forged and asked for an affidavit of forgery. No threats were made.
• Wal Mart of Morehead City, NC: Well after having been advised that the checks were stolen and forged and having been provided with a copy of the police report to that effect, this Wal Mart had the main office send a letter accusing my son of not having in the past taken care of his obligations in a timely matter (a reference to the forged check passed at New Bern) and threatening prosecution. I posted a complaint at http://www.walmartstores.com/wmstore/wmstores. The reply I got told me that if I had a problem, call them on the phone.
• Winn-Dixie: Sent multiple letters demanding payment of the amount of the checks and additional amounts. Made no acknowledgment that the checks were stolen/forged. Well after having been provided with notification that the checks were stolen and forged, and having been provided with a notarized affidavit of forgery, Winn-Dixie's agent, Collection Management Services, persisted in sending my son threatening letters demanding payment for the forged checks. This prompted me to post a complaint on their web page at http://www.winndixie.com/comments/main.asp. To their credit, I got a response the very next morning, advising that my complaint had been forwarded to the Divisional Office for investigation. The Check Recovery Manager at the Raleigh Divisional Office emailed about my complaint and apologized for the problems. I replied to that email with additional details and a copy of the original letter my son had sent explaining the situation to Winn-Dixie. He assured me that Compucred would not be hassling my son any more. The quick response from the divisional office reduced, somewhat, my bad attitude about Winn-Dixie.

Numerous other checks were cashed and the persons or firms having accepted them never contacted my son. With the help of the credit union, he did learn the identity of some of those persons/firms. I assume these were the persons/firms who trusted the credit union when the check was returned marked as haven been stolen. Here are the names of those persons/firms:

Here are some links that may be useful to people who are dealing with having had their checks stolen and forged:

Federal Trade Commission
National Check Fraud Center
Short article by another victim of stolen checks

Contact Information for the Webmaster,
Dr. Karl L. Wuensch

This page most recently revised on 22. November 2002.