(A) The Dearborn County Prosecutor may establish a Bad Check Collection Program whereby any person who is the payee or holder of a bad check and who intends to prosecute the issuer of the bad check under I.C. 35-43-5-5 if such check is not made good may:
(1) Authorize the Prosecutor to contact the issuer of the bad check to determine if such person wishes and intends to make the check good in accordance with I.C. 35-43-5-5(e) in lieu of prosecution;
(2) Authorize the Prosecutor to collect, on behalf of the payee or holder of the bad check, a protest and service fee in such amount as the Prosecutor may stipulate and fix on a uniform basis (which may be a fixed dollar amount or a percentage of the value of the bad check), but which may not exceed the amount permitted under I.C. 34-24-3-1;
(3) Authorize the Prosecutor to retain all service fees collected by the Prosecutor pursuant to the foregoing division in consideration of the services provided to the payee or holder by the Prosecutor.
(4) The Prosecutor may waive the collection of the fee if the Prosecutor finds that probable cause for prosecution no longer exists.
(B) Upon implementation of the Bad Check Collection Program, as authorized by division (A) above, the Prosecutor may require the check writer to remit restitution in the principal amount of any bad check along with all other fees permitted by law. Checks for reimbursement of the principal amount of the bad check plus the protest fee from such account may be written to the payee or holder of the bad check to whom the money is lawfully due without appropriation. All service fees collected pursuant to division (A) above shall be regularly delivered to the County Treasurer for deposit in the Prosecutor's Bad Check Services Fund established hereinafter in division (C).
(C) A Prosecutor's Bad Check Services Fund is hereby established. The purpose of the fund is for deposits of service fees received under divisions (A) and (B) above. The County Council may only appropriate monies on deposit in the Prosecutor's Bad Check Services Fund for the purposes of the Prosecutor's Office, at the discretion of the Prosecutor, although such appropriations may be made for any purpose county monies may lawfully be appropriated to the Prosecutor's Office and need not necessarily be limited to attributable costs of the functions and services from which the fees derive. Any money remaining in the fund at the end of the year does not revert to any other fund but continues in the Prosecutor's Bad Check Services Fund.
(BC Ord. 2011-02, passed 1-18-11)