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Highlands Today

Counterfeit Bills Popping Up In Highlands County

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By JIM KONKOLY

Highlands Today

Published: July 22, 2008

SEBRING - When they are handed cash, many cashiers around Highlands County are now taking a long, hard and close-up look at the bills handed to them.

People who get cash for any reason should start doing the same, to protect themselves.
Counterfeit bills have recently starting showing up around Highlands County, according to the Highlands County Sheriff's Office and the Sebring Police Department.

Nine confirmed cases of counterfeit bills being passed over the past five weeks are being investigated by both agencies.

While that's not an avalanche of "funny money" flooding the area, Lt. Tim Lethbridge of the sheriff's office said it's a good reason to check out the cash that's handed to you.

When police hear of just one counterfeit case, it's virtually guaranteed that they'll hear of many more, in a hurry, according to Lethbridge, who supervises the sheriff's investigators.

"This tends to be a crime that comes in waves," he said. "We won't have any counterfeit money for a time. But then when you get one report, you tend to get multiple reports."

People and businesses that accept counterfeit bills are stuck. They have to turn them into a police agency and they don't get reimbursed.
Lethbridge said the sheriff's office is investigating three recent cases of counterfeit bills being passed. Sebring police are investigating six such cases reported over the past five weeks, according to Commander Steve Carr.

Counterfeit $10 bills are the most common passed in the Sebring cases, Carr said.

"We've had four tens, a $20 and a $50," he said of the bogus bill incidents.

Carr agreed with Lethbridge that there may be no counterfeit cases for month, and then a flurry of them in a brief period of times. People should be "alert" to this form of theft now, he said.

Often times, Carr said, incidents of passing counterfeit bills show up suddenly in an area and disappear fairly quickly.

"Usually these (counterfeit) incidents don't stay in one area for long," Carr said. People passing off bogus bills, he said, "usually pass through and keep going (to another area).

"Once everyone becomes aware of it going on, they start looking for it," Carr said. "And in these days of video surveillance, they (counterfeiters) don't tend to stay in one place very long."

Carr said Sebring police aren't assuming the bad-money passers are gone.

"We're trying to keep on top of this," he said.
Sebring police and the sheriff's office are sharing the information on each bogus bill incident, and also passing the bills and the information on to the U.S. Secret Service.

There's good news and bad news for people who don't want to get stung by accepting a counterfeit bill.

First the bad news.

"With today's technology," Lethbridge said, "unlike the old days when they had to use printing plates, it's far easier to make counterfeit money, in any denomination, using photo shop and color printers."

Now the good news.

Due to the watermarks and other security features on the new currency being produced, people can readily detect a phony bill by looking closely at its features.

"One of the security features of current bills is the watermark," Lethbridge said. This mark is an image of the president who appears in the center of the bill. The watermark of that president's face shows up on the right side of the bill when a person looks at the bill closely and rotates it back or forward.

"The reason the watermark (of the president's image) is important is that some counterfeiters have taken one dollar bills and bleached them and reprinted them with another denomination," Lethbridge said.

On such counterfeit bills, it can be extremely difficult to detect that George Washington's image in the center of a $1 bill has been changed to President Andrew Jackson's image on a $20 or Benjamin Franklin's image on a $100, Lethbridge said.

But, he said, the watermark image on the right side of the bill cannot be imprinted on a counterfeit bill, because the U.S. Treasury Department prints that watermark in the middle of the bill, not on the outside.

"We've had several of those, where a $1 bill was changed to a different denomination," Carr said. "That's called 'washing.'"
Lethbridge and Carr said all counterfeit bills they take in as evidence are sent to the U.S. Secret Service, which, among other duties such as guarding the president, is in charge of counterfeit cases.

"For a small case, they are likely to have us investigate it," Lethbridge said. "If it appears that one of our cases relates to one of their larger counterfeit investigations, then they would be likely to assume the lead in the investigation and they may have us assist them."

For detailed information on how to detect counterfeit money, and confirm that a bill is legitimate, go to the U.S. Treasury's web site: www.ustreas.gov.

Jim Konkoly can be reached at 863-386-5855 or by e-mail atjkonkoly@highlandstoday.com

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