The Herald, Sharon, Pa.

Local News

May 29, 2008

Checks are fake, police report; Nonprofit group’s name different now

By Patrick W. Connelly

FARRELL, WHEATLAND — Three women tried to cash fake checks on Tuesday worth almost $1,400 bearing the name of a Farrell-based nonprofit company, police said.

The checks, which Southwest Mercer County Regional police Chief Riley Smoot Jr. said are counterfeit, were made payable from a fake account with “Minority Health Advocacy Inc.”

Minority Health Center is a real organization but had nothing to do with the checks, its executive director Olive Brown-McKeithan said.

The women tried to cash the checks around 1 p.m. at Stop ’n Save on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Wheatland, Smoot said.

In addition to trying to pass the fake checks, the women also showed the cashier fake driver’s licenses from Florida and Ohio, Smoot said.

The cashier made copies of the checks and licenses before refusing to cash the checks, prompting the women to leave, the chief added.

The checks were in the amounts of $409, $491 and $495 each and made payable to the fictional Darschelle Scott, Tamisha Berger and Jamila Worthy, each of whom wrote a Farrell address on the checks.

“Apparently they got a title of a business and made up their own checks,” Smoot said,

The real Minority Health Center had formerly gone by the title on the checks, but in 2002 changed to its current name, Ms. Brown-McKeithan said.

The center provides educational programs in churches and the local community, she said. The center’s checks look nothing like the ones used, she added.

The fake checks say the center specializes in hospice care but it has no such programs.

Another fake check was also reported to have been passed on Wednesday in Hubbard, Smoot said.

Police haven’t been able to locate the women and no charges have been filed, Smoot noted.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Southwest Regional at 724-983-2720, the chief said.

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