Non-Sufficient Funds (NSF) Check

INVESTIGATION OF BAD CHECK S

What can I do to protect myself from becoming the victim of a bad check?
The information that must be collected for each and every accepted cheek is as follows. Proper identification from the person writing the check, which includes picture identification such as a driver’s license, state identification card, military identification or any other official picture identification issued by the government or state.

The picture identification must include the person’s date of birth, document number (such as the driver’s license number), person’s address, the person’s physical description, and a picture of the person. When accepting a check from a person you or your employees should verify that the person writing the check is the same person on the form of identification that is looked at.

You or your employee must write on the check the identification number and the state of issue, the person’s date of birth, and the name on the identification. After writing this information on the check, you or your employee should write your employee number or the acceptor’s initials next to the information.

The reason for the employee number or initials is so the employee can assist us in identifying who wrote the check at a later date. If all of the above information is not gathered at the time the check is accepted it may be difficult if not impossible to prosecute.

What to do if you still become the victim of a bad check?
Before the police department will open an investigation the business owner / victim must first attempt to collect on the check. This is done by sending a certified letter to the person who wrote the check requesting full payment of the check and any fees that the business charges for the collection of the check. In this letter, do not threaten criminal prosecution in any way. Do not agree to installment payments or partial payments for the check. What you must never do is threaten prosecution in this letter! If you threaten prosecution in your collections letter we will be unable to open a case for you.

As much as the police department and the prosecuting attorney’s office would like to help you with your collections, we are not able to legally do so. The only time we can assist you is if you are willing to prosecute the writer of the bad check. We can only help with prosecution if you have followed the above procedure to try to collect the money yourself.

The first step in turning a “bad” check over to the police department for investigation is completing an Insufficient Funds and Account Closed Checks Submission For Investigation form. This form is available at the McCall Police Department or from any one of our patrol officers. It is a good idea to get a copy of this form and then to make many copies to have on hand at your business. This form must be completed and submitted to the police department with the “bad” check within 45 days of the check being written.

What happens now? I was unable to collect the money,
and I filled out the form within the 45 day time limit.
Will you collect my money now?

The first thing that will happen is that an officer will be assigned your case and an investigation will be done. After the officer completes the investigation the case is usually sent to the Valley County Prosecutor’s office for review and charges. If the person who wrote the check is found guilty or pleads guilty, the prosecutor can request the court to order restitution be paid to the business owner / victim in the case. The restitution payments will be paid to the Valley County Court Clerk’s Office and then the clerk’s office will send a check to the business owner / victim in the case.

Detective Larry Stokes is the department investigator and can answer any additional questions .
He can be reached at (208) 634-7144.