Florida Bagel Shop Worker Accused of Using Fake $500K Check to Scam Cheyenne Banks

Cowboy State Daily and ABC 4 contributed to this report.

A Florida man who sells bagels for a living is heading into federal court Tuesday in Wyoming, accused of helping pull off a half-million-dollar bank scam that stretched from Cheyenne to Orlando.

Prosecutors say Daniel K. McDougal wasn’t just slinging cream cheese — he was allegedly orchestrating a counterfeit-check scheme with a partner, using Wyoming banks to try to cash in big. If convicted, he’s looking at up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The trouble began in late 2022, when the US Treasury mailed a $560,625 check to a Los Angeles insurance company. It never arrived.

According to investigators, McDougal’s alleged co-conspirator, Kennard Bouk III, took advantage of that missing check. On Jan. 9, 2023, Bouk walked into a Blue Federal Credit Union branch in Cheyenne and opened a business account under a name almost identical to the real insurance company. He even showed fake business records claiming he ran an insurance firm out of Casper.

Later that same day, prosecutors say, Bouk deposited a counterfeit version of that Treasury check.

He immediately withdrew $20,000 in cash, then raced to another Blue branch to pull another $7,000 before the bank finally froze the account after spotting the fraud.

Investigators say Bouk then wrote a series of checks totaling nearly $289,000 from the fake business account to another company: Spring Flowers and Plants Inc.

Florida records list McDougal as the president of that business — and bank records show he was the sole controller of the account where the money landed.

When agents arrested Bouk later that year, he was working at a bagel shop owned by McDougal’s family. On his phones, investigators say they found WhatsApp messages linking McDougal directly to the scheme — including arranging flights, rentals, lodging, and strategizing about which Wyoming and Colorado branches Bouk should “hit” before closing time.

Location records also reportedly placed the Spring Flowers debit card at the Orlando airport and then in Denver, suggesting McDougal flew out to meet Bouk during the operation. Both men later boarded the same Southwest flight back to Florida.

Bouk pleaded guilty to bank fraud in May and is currently serving 41 months in federal prison. McDougal was indicted this fall, and his first court appearance is set for Tuesday in US District Court in Wyoming.

If the allegations are true, investigators say the pair nearly walked away with more than half a million dollars — all traced back to one missing Treasury check.