Federal suit targets collection agency

Mishawaka woman says tactics to collect bad check went too far.

By MATTHEW S. GALBRAITH

Tribune Staff Writer

Hamilton

SOUTH BEND -- Maria Hamilton could not believe what she was reading in the letter marked "official notice" and signed by St. Joseph County Prosecutor Michael Dvorak.

The prosecutor had received a crime report alleging that she had written a check without sufficient funds to cover it, she was advised in underlined, bold, typed print.

A conviction could mean up to a three-year jail sentence and a $10,000 fine.

She could avoid a court appearance if she agreed to enroll in a bad check restitution program and pay for all reported bad checks as well as program fees.

Failure to comply, the three-page notice warned her, "may subject you to criminal court proceedings."

Hamilton, a stickler about balancing her checkbook and obeying the law, was bewildered. The Mishawaka resident was being accused of a crime for writing a $29.48 check to a Big Lots store that bounced, she says, because of a late bank deposit.

But with the added fees, she would have to pay $251.98 to take care of it.

"Since when is it a crime to make a mistake? I mean, how many people make a mistake with their checking account?" she asked recently.

"I'm not a criminal," she recalled thinking. "Don't be putting me in jail."

When she eventually found out who was behind a barrage of accusatory mail, with the help of the Notre Dame Legal Aid Clinic, Hamilton struck back with a lawsuit.

The federal suit, filed July 19, seeks class-action status on behalf of others who have similar experiences stemming from bad checks.

"It's not fair. It's not right, and someone should do something about it. The people should know," she said.

The suit seeks more than $100,000 in damages under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. It also requests a permanent court injunction barring the defendants from "impersonating the prosecuting attorney."

The message sender

The notice -- and several more increasingly threatening letters that followed over a seven-month period -- did not come from the prosecutor or any of his employees.

They were sent by a California company that's under contract with the prosecutor to run a pretrial diversion program that consists mainly of restitution and financial management seminars.

The company, American Corrective Counseling Services, calls itself the nation's largest private contractor to prosecuting attorneys who have bad check programs.

Its Web site lists partnerships in 14 states and in six of Indiana's counties.

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