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Area woman is charged with forgery

ELKINS — An area woman is facing felony charges after allegedly writing and cashing checks belonging to a woman for whom she was a caretaker.

Betty Jean Shreve, 61, of Beverly, is charged with one felony count of forgery/uttering. She is free on a $10,000 cash or surety bond, set by Randolph County Magistrate George M. “Mike” Riggleman.

According to a criminal complaint filed in Randolph County Magistrate Court, on Jan. 17, Elkins Police Department Senior Patrolman B.D. Tice received a complaint regarding a caretaker who had stolen checks from the woman she was taking care of and made them out for cash.

The daughter of the alleged victim reportedly told police Shreve was taking care of her mother and, while checking her mother’s bank account, she noticed the last two checks that had been signed were not signed by her mother.

Shreve had allegedly told the complainant’s sister she was cashing checks for the alleged victim to send to the complainant. That is when the alleged victim’s daughter began looking into her mother’s finances and located four checks that were written to cash and signed by Shreve, the complaint states.

Tice noted in the report the four checks had an obviously different signature from the alleged victim’s signature found on a “good check.” The four checks totaled $1,300.

A criminal history check on Shreve was conducted which revealed she had a similar conviction for attempting to obtain less than $200 in 1994, the complaint states.

On Jan. 23, the alleged victim’s daughter provided Tice with a checkbook register that showed some of the pages were removed and revealed a jump in check numbers from several checks that were missing, according to the complaint.

If convicted, Shreve could be sentenced to not less than one nor more than 10 years in the state penitentiary.

Or, at the discretion of the court, sentenced to not more than one year in jail and fined not more than $500.

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