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Dorchester man gets 15 months for using bleach, inkjet printer to turn low-denomination bills into counterfeit Benjamins
By adamg on Wed, 10/23/2019 - 9:51pm
A Dorchester man who used bleach to remove the ink from $1 and $5 bills and then used an ink-jet printer to turn them into bogus $100 bills will spend 15 months in a federal prison following his sentencing today in US District Court in Boston.
Franklin Perry, 53, pleaded guilty in April to one count of dealing in counterfeit currency and two counts of passing and uttering counterfeit obligations of the United States, the US Attorney's office in Boston reports.
Perry, who was caught up in a larger probe of drug dealing in Boston and Brockton, sold ten counterfeit $100s - priced at $30 apiece, to a "cooperating witness" on June 27, 2018, the feds say. About a month later, he used $500 worth of his counterfeit money to buy stuff at a store in Westwood - including a new inkjet printer - and then another $500 worth of bogus bills at another Westwood stores.
According to an affidavit by a Secret Service agent on the case, bleaching let Perry use actual currency notes - and it didn't whiten the red and blue fibers or damage the watermarks that are a prominent part of actual bills.
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Comments
Dude got greedy.
If he'd printed up a batch of $20s rather than $100s, I bet he'd have gotten away with it. Or maybe he already had, and decided to move up.
Anyway, I find it surprising that his bleaching method didn't erase the watermark or the color fibers (also surprising that they'd publicize this). I'm curious how he got caught. Was it just the "cooperating witness" informing on him, or did the bills give him away?
Would love to see a really good procedural crime thriller about the counterfeiting business from a Scorsese, a Fincher, or a Soderbergh. The only one I can remember is "To Live and Die in L.A." which I remember liking a lot back in the day (though I'm guessing the Wang Chung soundtrack might sound a tad dated these days). Haven't seen it streaming anywhere though.
There's a raft of authentication schemes built into the money
It started with the ink, which accidentally turned out to have a magnetic signature. That was around 100 years ago, and once it was discovered, the Bureau of Printing & Engraving wrote that into the specifications. There are a lot of other things now, including the watermarks, colored fibers, and microprinting. Those you can see, but the magnetism in the inks and a bunch of other things, you can't see. There are high-speed scanning machines that can sort through thousands of bills a minute and kick out those that fail any of the authentication tests. Unless you're the Chinese government or have comparable resources, your counterfeits are going to be detected before long, and you'll be busted.
Absolutely...
...but from everything I've read, the paper (actually cloth) is virtually impossible to replicate, which is why the bleach method would appeal to the would-be counterfeiter. Fake paper would be a dead giveaway, but would an average cashier be able to detect a fake $1, $5, $10, or $20 printed on the real paper? I think they would definitely be more suspicious of a $50 or a $100, though.
Especially given the quality of color home printers these days, I'm amazed this isn't a huge problem. Back in the '80s, the agency I worked for got a top-of-the-line color photocopier, and we were warned in no uncertain terms not to go anywhere near the thing with currency. I think the Secret Service had those things under surveillance :-)
100% rag
I used to know someone whose husband worked in a high-quality print shop. Among the things they printed were stock certificates, which were printed on paper called 100% rag, the same paper used for printing money. They got it from a controlled source, and had to account for every sheet.
Another
Louis "The Coin" Colvecchio just got busted for counterfeiting hundred dollar bills - his claim to fame was casino chip counterfeiting. From memory, his documentary was almost as satisfying as a Scorcese film. I seem to recall it was not the History Channel one, but another one on the line of World's Greatest Masterminds.
I remember seeing that documentary
Apparently, his forged chips were so close to the authentic ones that some of them are still in circulation today.
Gil Grissom, criminal mastermind
It was always funny to see Petersen playing a crime lab tech after playing a rogue agent pretty convincingly in 'To Live and Die in LA'
Many color LaserJet printers
Many color LaserJet printers are actually traceable by microscopic yellow dots. So if you print a bill it would leave the mark behind saying what printer it was printed from.
As far as we know Inkjet printers have not done this yet but who knows.
To Live and Die in LA
Have seen that movie a few times including when it came to the theaters. Was William Friedkin's directorial comeback, one of Willem Dafoe's first movies, the wrong way chase scene, and the Wang Chung soundtrack. Enjoy the cheesiness of Wang Chung, hearing Dance Hall Days or Everybody have fun tonight reminds me of summer back in the early 80's.
I don't know who owns the streaming rights, maybe Warner Brothers, as they are holding back content until their platform is released.
Money
Spent all that time & effort and $$$ for materials, he could've gotten a job and come out ahead in the end.
How long do you soak them?
How long do you soak them?