It started out innocently in early December, when Chicago Heights resident Don Tornow, a Daily Southtown subscriber, sent a check for a holiday tip to his delivery person.
The $10 check somehow was altered to show a payment of $9,500 and was cashed two months later. Tornow spent weeks working with his bank to get the money returned to his account.
Tornow, 85, said he believes he was the victim of mail theft, because he sent three checks, including the $10 one, at the same time. The two other checks, for his water and gas bills, were never cashed and Tornow later voided them.
Chicago Heights police are investigating the forgery incident, noted in a Feb. 22 police report, but said they could offer no other comment because the investigation is ongoing.
The initial incident report does not reference a possible mail theft but rather a forgery.
On Feb. 7, an altered check bearing the same number as the $10 check Tornow wrote Dec. 6 to the newspaper carrier, was cashed and $9,500 was withdrawn from his Chase Bank account. A facsimile of the check shows it apparently being made payable to “Tatiana Swan,” with a date of Feb. 6. That is not the name of the newspaper delivery person who had solicited holiday tips.
Funds were withdrawn from Tornow’s account the following day. The altered check shows other information, such as the bank routing number, and it is difficult to decipher the names on the signature line on the front of the check as well as the endorsement line on the back of it.
Tornow says he is at a loss to explain how his $10 check was altered to show an amount approaching $10,000 and that police have told him they’re not entirely sure what happened.
“The scamming today is unbelievable,” Tornow said. “People have learned to get around the system.”
Tornow said that, with the help of Chicago Heights police, he was able to get the $9,500 returned to his account in early March. He said he learned, through police, the check was cashed at a bank other than Chase.
A representative with Chase said the bank could not comment on a specific customer account but that “we understand that the customer is satisfied with the resolution.”
Tornow said that there had been a flyer tucked inside his newspaper with the delivery person’s name and address, thanking the customer for “letting me serve you this year” and asking that “all gifts & donations” be forwarded to his address in Markham.
Tornow said when he noticed on his January bank statement the $10 check hadn’t been cashed, he sent two letters to the delivery person asking about it, but did not get a response.
It was not clear whether the news carrier got the $10 check, and Tornow wonders if it was stolen from a mailbox.
“I saw an article in the Southtown about (mail thefts) and thought maybe it happened to me,” he said.
Tornow said he dropped off three checks in early December — the utility payments and the check that was later forged — at an outside collection box at the Chicago Heights post office.
Messages left Tuesday with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and Chicago Heights police regarding possible mail thefts from that location were not immediately returned.
Thefts of mail at collection points outside post offices in the Chicago suburbs have resulted in investigations by postal authorities in recent months.
In late 2019, postal inspectors were involved following several reports of checks being stolen from mail collection points in Chicago Heights, including those in front of the post office.
In New Lenox, three outside mail collection boxes were removed at the post office there earlier this year as postal authorities investigated a report of theft of mail. Initially, two of the boxes had been secured with tape in a way to prevent them from being used.
The boxes were removed at some point after New Lenox police investigated a Feb. 21 incident in which one of the boxes was pried open.
Thefts of mail containing checks have occurred in other Chicago suburbs, according to an investigation by the baiduhai and another Tribune suburban publication, Pioneer Press.
The report showed numerous instances of checks mailed from the Park Ridge post office that had been intercepted, altered and cashed by people who were not the intended recipients.
A Dolton man, Kelvin Dortch Jr., has been charged in federal court in connection with alleged mail thefts at the Park Ridge post office, and a status hearing in that case is set for April 29.
Several days after Dortch’s arrest last September, the three connected mailboxes outside the Park Ridge post office were, like in New Lenox, taped off and sealed, preventing them from being used, and new boxes later installed.
Par Ridder, general manager for the baiduhai, said the company did not have a comment on the matter regarding the check Tornow sent to his newspaper delivery person.
Tornow said the incident has left him nervous about sending checks in the mail, but at the same time he doesn’t like the idea of having funds taken from his account automatically for bills such as utilities.
“I’m running scared now,” he said.
Tornow said he had to change his bank account after the check incident.
“It really screwed my whole life up,” he said.