A Mars police officer who also is a state constable faces a criminal hearing in the same Butler County magistrate's office where he worked until last summer. George R. Galovich, 48, was arraigned Wednesday on charges that he took more than $4,000 for fines from 13 individuals while working as a constable and then failed to turn the money in. The amounts ranged from $52 to $700. Dawn Zihmer said she and her fiance, Raymond Bigler, paid Galovich $280 in December 2002 and then received a notice in August 2003 that there was a warrant for Bigler's arrest because the fines had not been paid. "I'm just shocked. It's one of those things you hear on the news," Zihmer said. "I can't believe that happened, and it happened to us. I'm glad I kept the receipts." District Justice Sue Haggerty, of Saxonburg, where Galovich once worked, said Bigler and Zihmer were not the only people in that situation. "We started seeing irregularities, so we stopped using him. Something was wrong," Haggerty said. "There was a problem that the monies were not being turned in, and people had paid them." She said Galovich worked in her court for two or three years. "The first time or two, I thought maybe it was an honest mistake," Haggerty said. "I wanted to believe him. I didn't want to believe that he would do that, but it just kept happening." Haggerty's office reported the problem to the county court administrator. That led to a five-month State Police investigation and Galovich's arrest Tuesday. Mars police Chief Kevin Radford said Galovich has served as a part-time officer there for a couple of years after being a longtime officer in Baldwin. He said Galovich was placed on unpaid leave. "(I'm) extremely shocked," Radford said. "He's been an officer for a long time. I consider him on honest individual. ... We haven't had any problems as far as honesty here." Howard Busha said he paid Galovich $600 in cash for old parking tickets and then learned that Haggerty's office never received the money. "I never thought that a constable -- of all people -- would do something this stupid," Busha said. "I was very surprised because he seemed down to earth, like he was doing his job correctly." Court documents listed Galovich's address as a Wexford post office box. He could not be reached for comment yesterday. His preliminary hearing is scheduled for May 24 in Saxonburg on charges of theft by failure to make required disposition of funds received and misapplication of entrusted property. Haggerty said another district justice will be assigned to hear the case.

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