New Orleans Criminal Court alleged victim of check forgery scheme ...

A Mississippi man, accused of forging $8,600 worth of bogus checks, is having a hard time finding an Orleans Parish judge to hear his case. All 12 on the Criminal District Court bench are, technically, his alleged victims.

Burnell McCann, 33, of Collins, Miss., is accused of creating bogus checks using the judicial administrator's routing and account numbers.

A check issued to a juror for their jury service was stolen in 2010, according to Deputy Judicial Administrator Shannon Sims.

McCann then allegedly ordered a batch of checks online, bearing the name of a Lafayette-based offshore drilling company, but used the routing and account number from the check pilfered from the juror, Sims said.

Sims said the office was balancing its books several months later and noticed a chunk of money missing - about 10 checks worth around $8,600.

McCann was charged for three of those checks. According to court documents, on Nov. 23, 2010, he wrote checks bearing the judicial administrator's account and routing numbers and cashed them at various banks and grocery stores in the region.

The checks were issued to McCann and signed by an imaginary person named Alfred J. Moss. The three checks were cashed for $495.45, $486.28 and $956.28, for a total of $1,338.

The remaining checks, Sims said, were cashed by others, maybe homeless people he recruited into the scheme.

No one else has been charged.

The offshore drilling company told the New Orleans Police Department that neither McCann nor Moss are employees, and sent a copy of an authentic payroll check for comparison, according to court documents.

McCann is charged with three counts of forgery and one count bank fraud, each charge punishable by up to 10 years in prison. He is being held at Orleans Parish Prison on a $10,000 bond.

Judge Keva Landrum-Johnson on Wednesday recused herself from McCann's case, citing her peculiar connection to it.

McCann's public defender Christen Chapman asked Landrum-Johnson to recuse the other 11 judges on the bench as well.

But Landrum-Johnson said each just must independently withdraw on their own. The case will be realloted to another court, and that judge must decline to hear it, 11 more times until, one by one, each judge has recused themselves from the case.

At that point, the state Supreme Court will be asked to appoint a special judge to oversee McCann's proceedings.

Source: http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2012/12/new_orleans_criminal_court_all.html

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