Counterfeit money passing through Alamo businesses
Alamogordo Daily News
By Duane Barbati, Staff Writer
Posted: 03/11/2011 12:00:00 AM MST
Alamogordo Department of Public Safety detectives are warning retailers and residents about counterfeit currency being passed throughout the community.
Lt. Israel Trujillo said counterfeiters have been using a color copier to produce counterfeit currency.
"Kmart, Walgreen's and Lowes grocery store have received counterfeit currency," Trujillo said. "Some of the counterfeit currency all had the same serial numbers on them. The majority of the bill denominations are $20s, $10s and some $5s. They're taking a washed-out $5 bill and copying over it with a $50 bill."
He said Kmart was the hardest hit with $320 in counterfeit currency.
"The bills were caught during a deposit at the bank," Trujillo said. "It was during one transaction at the store. It's an open investigation. We want everyone in the community to be extra careful with their money or currency. If the bill looks different or funny, we're asking them to notify law enforcement. We'll pick the money up and give the information to the U.S. Secret Service."
One of the missions of the U.S. Secret Service is to safeguard United States currency against counterfeiting.
He said detectives are continuing their investigation of the counterfeit currency.
"Albuquerque police have made three arrests of counterfeiters," Trujillo said. "One additional arrest is pending. We're trying to determine if the counterfeiting in Albuquerque is connected to the counterfeiting in Alamogordo."
He said retailers and banks are reporting receiving counterfeit currency through different types of transactions.
"There is no set time of day or night that counterfeiters are passing the bills off," Trujillo said. "Banks are receiving them in nightly deposits from retailers. Retailers are unintentionally receiving them during their business transactions. It's not the fault of the retailer because they do get busy with customers. They really can't check every bill. Counterfeiters are purchasing gift cards or a prepaid credit card type of cards. They take it to another store to purchase merchandise with it."
He said retailers and consumers need to look at the magnetic stripes embedded into each denominations of 20, 10 or five dollar bills.
"A person can hold the bill up to a light and see the magnetic stripes in the bill," Trujillo said. "It has the correct denomination of a five, 10 or 20 dollar embedded into the stripe. Counterfeiters are using color laser copiers to counterfeit the currency. People need to look at the magnetic strip on the front and back of the bill to determine if it's counterfeit currency. They need to look at it from both sides of the bill. The quality of the bill is not as good as a real bill."
He said counterfeiters are using the new model copiers to duplicate the different colors and details of the U.S. currency.
"If you look closely at a counterfeit bill, there are some variances in the fake bill's colors and detail compared to a real U.S. Treasury issued currency," Trujillo said. "If someone did not pay attention to the detail in the currency, a person could not tell if the bill is fake or real. They're using a paper that sometimes is hard to tell the difference between the fake and real bills.
"Counterfeiters are crumpling the fake bills up to appear as a real paper currency or worn out so a person will not second guess it."
He said the biggest mistake is people are not looking at the magnetic strip in the currency. "There is a water mark on each bill issued by the Treasury," Trujillo said. "If a person looked closely at the water mark of the copied $50 over the $5, it's not the same water mark as the one on a $50. A lot of people are still using the counterfeit detector pens. The pens are giving a lot of false positives on counterfeit currency because of the quality of the paper being used. I suggest retailers use an infrared detection device or another type of counterfeit detection device."
Anyone who has information about counterfeit currency or who suspects they received counterfeit currency can contact the ADPS Detective Division at 439-4300 or Crime Stoppers at 437-2000.
http://www.alamogordonews.com/ci_17588844
Original Post