Officials Hunt for 4,000 Stolen County Checks

Oops.

Los Angeles County is missing something, and would like very much to get it back, quietly--a box of 4,000 blank checks that bear its name.

People have tried to cash several of the checks since they were taken a month ago during minor flooding at the county Hall of Administration, officials said Wednesday.

Each check bears the county logo, and the promise that the county treasurer is good for the money. The checks, otherwise known as warrants, are used to pay everything from salaries to lawsuit and trust settlements.

“I have people looking into it, and law enforcement is too,” said Assistant Auditor-Controller J. Tyler McCauley. “I’m not real pleased, of course.”

Sheriff’s Sgt. Ron Spear said that his department has little to say about the caper or about any suspects. “The majority of the details of the case are not going to be releaseable to protect the integrity of the investigation,” Spear said. He said one person was apprehended and later released pending further investigation.

The case is being investigated at the direction of Undersheriff Jerry Harper, county documents indicate. Sources said the Sheriff’s Department arrested three suspects Wednesday and was searching for at least one more.

Although the county probably will not have to honor the checks, their “disappearance” has sent county officials into a mad scramble to find them. After all, most merchants and check-cashing outlets wouldn’t look twice at a check that bears the name of the nation’s largest county government, officials concede. In addition to enlisting the help of the Sheriff’s Department’s forgery/fraud detail, a warning has been issued to check-cashing agencies.

Although county officials are mostly mum about the checks, they will say that they believe they were stolen on Dec. 11.

That’s when the checks were moved during a flood in the basement of county headquarters. Apparently someone left them in an unsecured area. “It’s one of those things where . . . in the midst of a crisis--in this case, the flooding--someone decides to get sticky fingers,” McCauley said.

The checks were from an account at Bank of America that is being phased out, Auditor-Controller Alan Sasaki said. Bank of America officials had no comment except to say that they have issued stop orders on the sequence of checks stolen.

In a memo to the Board of Supervisors, Sasaki said officials first noticed that the checks were missing when internal controls during routine processing detected that at least two had been forged and cashed and then presented to Bank of America for repayment.

“While the county should not suffer a financial loss due to the forgery of the warrants, legitimate holders of county warrants may be subject to increased scrutiny when cashing their warrants,” Sasaki wrote.

In other words, anyone planning to use or cash a check that bears the name of Los Angeles County may expect serious questioning in the near future--perhaps even by the Sheriff’s Department.