Prosecutors contend Unity man used bogus check scheme to pay for daughter's wedding

Westmoreland prosecutors said a Unity man used a home computer to forge checks written on a bogus account to pay vendors hired for his stepdaughter’s 2020 wedding.

“Embrace the mess,” Assistant District Attorney Cassidy Hatten told jurors as she outlined the four cases against Joseph Malago, 51, who faces multiple counts of forgery, theft, bad checks and allegations of illegal weapons possession in a trial that started Tuesday. “If it weren’t for great police work and multiple victims coming forward this might not have been uncovered.”

Malago is accused of using bogus checks at Latrobe grocery store in early September 2020 that he forged using account information from a local car dealership.

It was the start of a scheme that prosecutors continued throughout the month. It resulted caterers and other service providers hired for his stepdaughter’s Sept. 24, 2020 wedding at Hempfield Park to remain unpaid.

Police claimed Malago drafted fake checks using a false business account totaling more than $20,000 to wedding vendors. Those checks later bounced, Hatten told jurors.

In late September 2020, he wrote another bogus check that he cashed at a local credit union, according to prosecutors.

A subsequent search of Malago’s home police found computers they contend he used to create the bad checks. They say they also found 11 weapons was not permitted to possess because of prior criminal convictions.

Defense attorney Mark Adams told jurors in his opening statement that prosecutors cannot prove Malago owned, possessed or sold the guns found in his home. He also suggested that Malago’s wife was the person who wrote out and gave checks to wedding vendors.

“There was no contracts with Mr. Malago,” Adams said while telling jurors the case against his client is short on evidence. “We’ll see what happens.”

The trial, before Westmoreland County Common Pleas Court Judge Tim Krieger is expected run through the end of the week.