Police see wave of counterfeit currency in northern Indiana

ELKHART, Ind. (AP) - Caroline DeMetz just stopped by Kroger in the Town and Country Shopping Center to pick up some groceries.

She never expected police to be called.

Earlier that Sept. 8 morning, the 72-year-old Mishawaka resident took herself out to breakfast at the Steak 'n Shake on Grape Road. She says she paid for her meal with a $50 bill, which was all she had on her at the time. She received two $20s in change.

Then, she headed to Kroger to buy groceries. When she went to pay, the police were called. It turned out that the $20s were counterfeit.

DeMetz was out $40.

"It's not unlike many other stories we've heard," said Lee Goehring, manager of loss prevention at 1st Source Bank. Occasionally, people will get change somewhere and find out later they have a counterfeit bill. Counterfeit $20s are the most common, but fake $100s, $50s, $10s and even $5s are not uncommon.

Over the past several months, the Elkhart Police Department has seen a dramatic increase in counterfeit currency cases. About 50 counterfeiting cases have been filed this year and the department has seen about 30 cases in the last five or six weeks. Other police agencies in the region also have reported counterfeit bills.

"A majority of the cases are coming from retail establishments and fast food restaurants," said Sgt. Chris Snyder, of the Elkhart police. "Places people are in and out of pretty quickly."

Often the number of cases the department sees will increase in the spring when there are garage sales or around the holidays, he said.

"This is a little early," he said. "Since July, our cases are way up. We're probably taking six or seven a week. We don't always get that many."

The threat of counterfeit U.S. currency has grown in recent years, according to the U.S. Secret Service website. People today can use a simple printer to try to copy money.

However, the number of fake to real U.S. bills is actually fairly small. About $156 million in counterfeit U.S. currency was circulating globally in 2013, according to the Secret Service's most recent accessible report.

"In the last three years, we've seen an increase, but it is very slight," Goehring said of counterfeit money that comes into 1st Source Bank. He explained that growth in local business could account for the slight rise and not necessarily a rise in counterfeiters.

"When you consider the amount of money coming in through deposits at all of our branches, the discovery of counterfeit bills is fairly small."

Some counterfeits are very obvious, he said. For example, several bills that 1st Source Bank found had Japanese characters in red ink printed on the bill. The bank also had a blue $20 and one where the counterfeiter had used a gel pen to imitate a real bills' color-shifting ink.

Other counterfeits are a little more difficult to detect, but there are a few key security features that people should look for. For example, a $20 bill has the color-shifting ink on the denomination in the bottom right-hand corner, a ghost portrait of Jackson on the right side and a security thread with the word twenty written over and over.

Each denomination's security features are different, he said, but anybody can become familiar with the security features on the bills. On Sept. 10, the U.S. Treasury Department launched a new website - uscurrency.gov - with tools that allow users to explore all designs and denominations of Federal Reserve notes.

"Educate yourself," Goehring said. "Learn where the security threads are and which bills have color-shifting ink. Look for those three things right off the top."

And don't, he added, depend on the security pens, which indicate if a bill is printed on U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing fabric.

"They have a shelf life," he said. "Also, sometimes counterfeiters take a smaller denomination bill and bleach it out and then reprint it in a higher denomination."

If someone runs across a counterfeit, they must turn it in to the local authorities. Passing money intentionally is a felony, with a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. It is illegal to pass counterfeit, even if the person is unaware the money is fake.

But police understand that sometimes the person passing the money is a victim, too, Snyder said. If someone does run across a suspect bill, police would like as much information as possible about where the bill might have come from so they can attempt to trace it back to its source.

In the DeMetz case, she was able to provide police with information, but had no way to prove where she picked up the money.

"I didn't even get a receipt," she said. "I was just getting breakfast and paid cash. I can't prove it, except my word."

There typically is no reimbursement for the victim in a situation like this, though some homeowners' policies might offer coverage, up to $500 or $1,000, depending on the policy.

That's why Goehring at 1st Source suggests that people check bills carefully before leaving a cash register and, "if you have a question about it, ask that it be changed."

Snyder also encourages businesses to set policies in place to check the money before accepting it. Often, businesses don't find the fake money until the end of the day when they are counting deposits, he said. At that point, it's difficult to know when the money came in.

"Smaller stores can't afford to keep losing $20s," he said. "This is one of the things that will drive prices up across the board."

The simplest way for businesses to identify real bills is to check for the security strip, he said. Buy a 99-cent flashlight and run the bills over it. If it doesn't have one, there is a chance it is counterfeit.

Of course, some old money still in circulation doesn't have modern safety features. But when a real bill is confiscated, it is returned to its owner after it's been checked.

DeMetz's grandson gave her a quick lesson on how to identify real money after her experience, and she plans to have him give her a more detailed explanation.

"I might flip through the bills or something when I get them, but other than that I don't look at them," she said. That is going to change.

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Information from: South Bend Tribune, http://www.southbendtribune.com