As of 5 p.m. Wednesday, approximately 19 people were jailed in conjunction with the district attorney’s office’s worthless check roundup, District Attorney Greg Gambril said.

“Roundups are often like throwing out fish nets, because you always end up catching more than just the fish you’re looking for,” Gambril said. “(Wednesday), people were arrested for outstanding violation of probation warrants, failure to appear warrants and other types of charges. Often, it takes the combined resources of several law enforcement agencies to find them.”

Gambril gave warning of the impending initiative at the end of June. He said, in addition to the 19 arrested, at least 10 others were located who were on the office’s “contact list.”

“(That means they were) persons who had written bad checks that we were on the brink of taking warrants out for,” he said. “Instead of taking out the warrants, we make contact with them and make arrangements for them to come in and take care of their bad checks.

“Obviously, taking out an arrest warrant is a last resort for (a bad check) and usually doesn’t happen until someone has been given several opportunities to repay,” he said.

Gambril said the roundup is likely to result in more than $10,000 in restitution paid to victims and in outstanding court costs.

Gambril expressed his appreciation to each of the law enforcement agencies participating in the roundup.

As of press time, a complete list of those arrested was not available. More details will be published in the Fri., July 17, edition of The Star-News.