A Butler County couple is accused of forging several blank business checks for thousands of dollars that they deposited into newly opened bank accounts.

Charles Roy Gage, 29, of Oakland Township and girlfriend Stacey A. Lecerf, 23, of Butler are wanted on arrest warrants in connection with a list of charges in the alleged scheme earlier this year.

Butler County detectives last week charged both defendants with theft by deception, conspiracy and several counts each of bad checks and forgery.

Investigators suspect Lecerf in January or February came into possession of the blank checks of a State College business. She claimed the checks were in a purse she found at her workplace in southern Butler County.

Lecerf told authorities, according to court documents, that she gave the checks to Gage. Soon after, detectives assert, the couple hatched their fraud scheme.

Gage in February opened a savings account and a checking account at a Butler bank. He allegedly forged four of the blank checks, written for a combined $3,157, that were placed into those accounts.

The checks were purportedly signed by an employee of the State College company; that employee, however, did not exist.

About the same time, Lecerf opened a checking account at a Butler Township bank, forging three of the stolen checks with the signature of the same fictitious employee on the checks that Gage used, documents said.

The three checks totaled $2,100, and were deposited into Lecerf's new account.

"Within days," the police affidavit said, "(Lecerf) began making withdrawals from this account."

A county detective on Oct. 28 interviewed Lecerf at the Butler County Prison, where she was being held on a warrant for failing to appear at a court hearing in an unrelated theft case.

She allegedly admitted her involvement with Gage in the ruse.

Gage, meanwhile, is currently in the State Correctional Institution at Camp Hill where he's serving a 1- to 5-year sentence in connection with two unrelated cases — one for identity theft and forgery and the other for a drunken driving conviction.