If you write a check with no money in your bank account to cover the cost of that written check then the check would bounce and you would get an overdraft charge.
So yes you could write the check to someone without the money in the checking account but the check would not clear the bank.
If you wrote the check to a place such as Walmart and the checking account had no money in it then the check would not go through there machine.
So you would not be able to make the purchases with the check without the funds.
If you write the check to a business and mail it to them then you would get an overdraft charge on your checking account and the bill etc still would not be paid.
Then if you continue to write bad checks with no money in the account you could be prosecuted for writing bad checks.