Millions of dollars are literally stolen from businesses and individuals in Tarrant County every year. This crime occurs not with a gun or threats of violence, but with a simple piece of paper and a pen. It is the criminal offense of "Theft-by-Check". The unique nature of this offense is that the victim usually does not know he or she is a victim of a crime until several weeks after the initial event took place. Further, this particular criminal offense often has a "ripple" effect on the public in that the original criminal conduct not only impacts the original victim, but in the case of a merchant victim, the loss is frequently passed on to the consumers making them victims as well.
 
When Criminal District Attorney Tim Curry took office, he recognized the need to provide assistance to the victims of this yearly multi-million dollar "rip-off" and establish a effective system to prosecute criminal hot check writers. Thus the Worthless Check Section was created. Since 1975, the District Attorney’s Office has collected in excess of $70,000,000 in restitution for worthless checks written to businesses in our community.
 
The Worthless Check Section, under Mr. Curry's direction has grown to be the largest department of this type in the State of Texas. It has been in the forefront in developing innovative methods and means to accomplish it goals of attempting to make the victims whole by obtaining restitution for their hot check losses, establishing techniques and training for use by businesses to avoid hot check losses and prosecuting criminal hot check writers.
 
Additionally, the office has provided leadership in drafting and obtaining new laws regarding worthless checks and related matters. It has established procedures and guidelines which have been adopted not only by other prosecutor offices in Texas, but other states as well.  It has become a resource office in providing assistance to law enforcement and prosecuting agencies. 
 
In the year 2006, the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney's Office collected over $2.1M in worthless check restitution in addition to obtaining criminal case probations or jail time for an additional $1M plus dollars more.