ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, July 31, 1996 TAG: 9607310067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY AND MEGAN SCHNABEL STAFF WRITERS
note: below
JACK SWINT has been charged with seven counts of obtaining money under false pretenses and is jailed in Bedford County.
A Roanoke Valley man whose history of forged and counterfeit checks was featured Sunday in a story in The Roanoke Times was jailed Tuesday in Bedford County.
John Joseph "Jack" Swint, who came to the newspaper pleading for a story so he would be caught, is charged with seven counts of obtaining money under false pretenses. Police say he cashed about $1,000 worth of counterfeit payroll checks at Bedford County stores.
Similar charges are likely to be filed against Swint by other Southwest Virginia counties, including Wythe, Campbell and Botetourt, said Bedford County Investigator Timothy Hayden.
The counterfeit checks credited to Swint in Bedford County carry logos of companies that Swint told the newspaper he regularly used. They include Papa John's, State Farm Insurance and Red Lobster. Hayden said he also has a counterfeit check from 1994 that Swint is believed to have created. It was on a fake Jim Walter Homes account.
At least one counterfeit payroll check cashed in Roanoke County fits Swint's style as well, said Roanoke County Detective Duane Palmer.
A $197 check designed to look like a payroll check from Terminix - one of the company names Swint said he had used - was cashed in April at a convenience store in Salem, Palmer said.
Roanoke County police have turned their case over to the FBI, he said. No federal charges have been filed.
Secret Service agents also are involved in the investigation, Hayden said.
Hayden said he had been trying to locate Swint since late May, when Swint called him last week and said he would come in Tuesday.
"He knew me from a previous arrest, in 1989," Hayden said. "I treated him nice then, and he felt like he could trust me. He was here before 8 a.m., as he'd promised.
"He said he was relieved that it was over," Hayden said.
If convicted for the Bedford County charges, Swint faces from two to 10 years per offense.
The police officer said he couldn't recall the circumstances under which he arrested Swint before, but he remembered Swint because he saw him on television program "A Current Affair."
Swint was on the show discussing his work as an undercover agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency. He has bounced from one side of the law to the other, even spending time as a police officer in East Bank, W.Va. He lost that job, as he did others, when he stole the town's checks, wrote some to himself and cashed them.
In the few times he was caught, Swint said, the punishment didn't make him stop his habit.
In April, Swint contacted the newspaper asking that a story be written exposing his life of crime.
"The only way I'll stop is for everybody to know my face," he said.
Swint's notoriety was causing problems at the Bedford County jail, however, said a spokesman.
"The other inmates are giving him a hard time. They all read the story about it," the officer said.
Swint, 42, said he has been obsessed with forging or making up checks since he was 11. Family members and records of his previous run-ins with the law confirm this.
He is expected to be arraigned today. He had not hired an attorney as of Tuesday.
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ROGER HART STAFF Jack Swint is a self-confessed payrollby CNBcheck and ID counterfeiter. He is likely to be arraigned today.