Hampton police charge 3 North Carolina residents with forging checks

Hampton Township police have charged three North Carolina residents with forgery after they tried to cash an altered check at a local bank branch.

The investigation began July 30 with a call to police from an employee of Citizens Bank. The employee reported that a woman using the drive-thru service was attempting to cash a check for $6,834 that appeared to be fraudulent because “the font on the typing was off,” according to a criminal complaint.

When officers arrived, they found a woman and two men in a car the bank employee identified and detained them for questioning.

Police contacted the Pittsburgh company that wrote the check and confirmed that it had been altered, according to court records.

Investigators said the woman who allegedly tried to cash the check, Leigha Justine Walker, 39, of Greensboro, N.C., told them she was in the area because she worked at a McDonald’s restaurant in North Carolina “and was looking to transfer her job here,” according to the complaint.

Walker, however, was not able to identify “where she was,” according to police.

Walker also told investigators the check she tried to cash was payment from an insurance company.

The driver and another passenger also were detained for questioning.

Police said they searched the vehicle after smelling marijuana. One of the passengers, Darrell Devern Thomas, 42, of Fayetteville, N.C., allegedly told officers that he “knew something about that,” but there was no marijuana in the vehicle because it was “all gone.”

No drugs were in the vehicle, but police said they found a prying tool, a flashlight and an envelope with three other checks, including one for $41,545 made out to a Cranberry Township company that produces brass rifle casings.

A check for $1,170 from Butler Memorial Hospital that had the name of the recipient “washed out” also was found in the envelope, police said. The third check was written to Keystone Collections for $9.

Cranberry police said the company that issued the $41,545 check, Peterson Cartridge Co., filed a report that its mailbox was broken into and that a check was missing.

After obtaining a warrant to search the vehicle, officers confiscated a small amount of cocaine, markers, colored pencils, a box cutter, razor blades and a typewriter ribbon, according to the complaint. Police say some of the items found in the vehicle were used to alter the checks.

A check from a construction company for $5,360 also was found during the second search.

Walker, Thomas and the third person in the vehicle, Quin Alexander Malloy, 29, Fayetteville, N.C., were each charged with three counts of forgery, four counts of receiving stolen property and one count of possession of an instrument of crime.

Thomas also was charged with drug possession.

The three suspects are in the Butler County Prison awaiting arraignment on Wednesday, according to District Judge Tom Swan’s office.

The three people arrested do not have attorneys listed in court records.