Checks

Question: Our landlord recently stopped depositing our rent checks. For the last five months she has received the checks, verbally acknowledged she had them, but said she was too busy to deposit them. When we asked for a receipt after noticing that the checks were not deposited, she ignored us. What is the best way to deal with this situation without antagonizing the landlord? Answer: Legally, your only responsibility is to "tender" the rent payment. Some rental agreements specify how payment is to be made and you need to document that you followed that procedure.

Former White House staff member Oliver L. North personally cashed $2,400 worth of traveler's checks he received from Nicaraguan contras and spent the funds on such items as groceries and snow tires, congressional investigators said Tuesday. And he gave another $1,000 worth of the checks as a wedding gift to one of the key aides in his secret contra operation, the North associate told the congressional committees investigating the Iran-contra scandal.

The U.S. House of Representatives has been shaken by a scandal so sweeping that some analysts believe it could result in the ouster by voters of an untold number of House members come November. The House is disclosing the names of 355 members and former members who cashed hundreds of thousands of dollars in bad checks against their accounts containing insufficient funds at the now-defunct House bank. The disclosure has become a symbol of a pampered Congress out of touch with the folks back home.

For two months now, the Rev. P. J. Jones hasn't shown up to take his customary seat on the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission, of which he has been a member for 16 years. The unusual string of absences began shortly after he and his wife were arrested in the lobby of a Florence-area bank on suspicion of trying to cash $379,000 worth of stolen and forged checks.

This is a snafu that gives new meaning to the old excuse that the check is in the mail. The state of California mailed a check for the stratospheric sum of $37,628,740 to the county of Orange more than two weeks ago. No one has seen it since. The check never appeared at the county Public Facilities Department, where it was intended to begin paying the state's share of $1.3 billion in ongoing improvements needed to forestall a catastrophic flood along the Santa Ana River.

A San Pedro Municipal Court judge on Friday issued an arrest warrant for a convicted slumlord who, after being ordered to pay his former tenants $16,000 in relocation fees, gave them a check that bounced. In a last-minute hearing, Judge Roy Ferkich gave landlord Martin Cantor until Monday at 1:30 p.m. to turn himself in to the court. If he does not show up at that time, the judge said, the warrant will become active.

If you own a home, you've probably received at least a couple of official-looking "checks" in the mail, made out to you personally for anywhere from $15,000 to $75,000. Often the checks resemble the one that arrived at the home of Arlington, Va., homeowners in May: It was for $41,750 and carried a prominent FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.) logo reading, "Each depositor insured to $100,000." It also featured a 10-digit "Reservation Number" and the boldface words "Voucher Certificate."

About 50,000 Social Security checks missing the names of beneficiaries were mailed this week to recipients mostly along the East Coast, in the Midwest and Texas. The Treasury Department has asked banks to refuse to cash them. Instead, the department is mailing replacement checks Saturday. People who were counting on money from their checks right away have little recourse but to wait. The problem was caused by a software change, spokeswoman Alvina McHale said.

The House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed and sent to the Senate on Tuesday a bill that eventually would require banks to clear most local checks within a day and out-of-town checks within a week. The bill, which was approved, 388 to 5, would override laws and regulations in 18 states, including California, that allow longer holds before checks are cleared. "It's time we gave the people access to their own money," said House Banking Chairman Fernand J. St Germain (D-R.I.

Authorities have arrested a Santa Ana man in connection with the theft in December of four checks from the county treasurer-tax collector's office. The checks, customarily made payable to Robert L. Citron, were written by property owners in settlement of their property taxes. But the taxpayers had left the space for the payee's name blank, apparently because Citron had resigned earlier that month.