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HARMAN -- A Pennsylvania man is behind bars after allegedly passing several fraudulent checks at local banks.
Gary Michael Mitchell, 41, is charged with felony counts of forging or uttering and fraudulent schemes. Mitchell is lodged in the Tygart Valley Regional Jail on a $5,000 cash-only bond set by Randolph County Magistrate Mike Dyer. He is also being held on a $20,000 cash-only bond set in Tucker County Magistrate Court.
According to a criminal complaint filed in Randolph County Magistrate Court by West Virginia State Police Corporal D.R. Wolford Jr., on Jan. 11 the officer was notified of an uttering and fraudulent schemes complaint at the Grant County Bank in Harman.
The officer met with the assistant branch manager at the bank on Jan. 4. The officer was told that Mitchell entered the bank and cashed a Grant County Bank check on an account in a different name in the amount of $4,185.14, to be paid to Mitchell, the complaint states. The assistant manager checked the available funds and verified the signature via the signature card.
The bank employee attempted to make small talk with Mitchell but could not get any detailed information from him, according to the complaint. The bank later found the check to be fraudulent and that Mitchell had allegedly cashed similar checks at the Grant County Bank branches in Davis, Canaan Valley, Harman, Riverton and Petersburg.
"By the time Mitchell attempted the same transaction at the Moorefield Branch, the bank had caught onto the scam, confronted Mitchell and he left the Moorefield Branch leaving the check on the counter," the complaint states.
Wolford viewed the video surveillance still frames of the suspect leaving the bank and Mitchell was identified by matching the video to the photograph on file with the Pennsylvania Department of Motor Vehicles.