TOLEDO, Ohio — Bowling Green police are investigating after the city's school district reported several incidents of stolen checks and fraudulent online payments in recent months.
In a police report filed Jan. 11, Bowling Green City Schools Treasurer Cathy Schuller reported checks have been cashed fraudulently and unauthorized automatic payments have been from school district accounts.
The district discovered in August 2023, that two fraudulent automatic payments had been deducted from the district's bank account at Premier Bank.
One of the automatic payments, for $885.06, went to "Peoples Gas Payment." The second, for $271.44, went to "Comed Payment Bill."
In the police report, school officials said they were unsure how the deductions occurred. School officials have closed that bank account, according to the report. Schuller told police Premier Bank is investigating the claims and reimbursed the school district.
Two more incidents of theft involved stolen paper checks, Schuller told police.
In the first case, the district sent a check for $2451.37 to Sunbelt Rentals, a local equipment rental company on Aug. 13, 2023. The check was cashed by someone else in Atlanta on Sept. 18., 2023, according to the police report.
A second paper check was sent to the Ohio History Connection in Columbus on Oct. 5, 2023, according to the report. It also was stolen and cashed by someone else on Nov. 4, 2023, in Columbus, Schuller told police.
In both cases, Schuller showed officers the returned paper checks. Neither had been "washed," a term that refers to the practice of fraudulently altering the amount on a check or the recipient of the check. Instead, someone other unknown person had endorsed the check and was able to cash it.
Schuller stated Premier Bank also is investigating those two thefts and that she is unsure whether the district will be compensated for those.
Schuller said she is unsure how the checks are being intercepted and the district does not have any suspects.
On Friday, Schuller told WTOL 11 that typically the mail carrier picks up the mail from the district building, but if the mail goes out later, an office worker will drop them in a USPS blue mailbox at the post office on her way home from work.
"I can't be sure whether those two checks were dropped in a blue USPS mailbox," Schuller said.
Bowling Green Schools Superintendent Ted Haselman did not return calls for comment on the issue Friday.
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