Chicago Man Sells TVs On Craigslist For Funny Money
Andre Callegari of Chicago unloaded some TVs on Craigslist, but got a wad of counterfeit cash in return. Then he set up another sale with the buyer in a sting operation, and the seller actually came back, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. The cops caught the bad guy, who paid Callegari some of what he owed him, but that's probably all the victim thinks he'll recover.
The story says Callegari's situation is far from an anomaly, other than the aspect of the counterfeiter being dumb enough to try the same scam twice on the same person. Counterfeit money continues to pump through the economy:
It's a situation that's on the rise, Secret Service spokeswoman Kristina Schmidt said.
"You have these new areas and methods to pass counterfeit (bills) that are driven by the Internet economy," she said. "Instead of someone going to the store ... there are these different avenues."
On the other hand, there isn't a general increase in counterfeiting, she said.
In Tinley Park, there have been eight reported cases of someone paying with fake money this year, police records show.
It's a crime that never really goes away, Tinley Park police Cmdr. Pat McCain said.
And Callegari, who is living with his wife and 9-month-old son at his brother's house, is still reeling from getting scammed earlier this month.
"Eight-hundred dollars might not seem like a lot, but it is when you're struggling," he said.
The same thing happened to my friend when he sold a car to an old lady through Craigslist. Possibly unknowingly, she slipped him a fake $100 bill in a stack of legitimate Benjamins. He ended up spending the bill anyway, unaware he got away with a federal offense.
Craigslist seller swindled with counterfeit money [Chicago Sun-Times]
(Photo: alexbehrens)
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wait, so if this 'friend' was unaware of the fake $100 bill, then spent it, how did it ever come to his attention? or was he just unaware spending fake money was illegal... ??
So if the author's friend above didn't know the bill was fake and got away with spending it, how did he find out that it was counterfeit?
When I sold a $1200 drum set on Craigslist, I brought a counterfeit detecting marker with me. The guy handed me the $1200 cash, and I marked each bill right in front of him. It was worth the $3 (Office Depot) for the marker to save the headaches later.
@WearingBlue4BillyMays_GitEmSteveDave: I believe thats correct, and that you can also send it somewhere (I cant remember to save my life) and have them refund the amount.
@WearingBlue4BillyMays_GitEmSteveDave: My guess is no. Here's the closest case I could find: [en.wikipedia.org]
@techstar25: And is almost total crap, I hate to tell you. The paper our flyers were printed on at the food store I worked at would not react to a counterfeit pen. And they can be fooled by a can of spray starch.
If you really want to check them, spend a few minutes studying the security embedded in the bills. Check for the micro-printing, the color shift ink, the water mark, the security strip, the feel, give the bill a "snap", check for the blue and red fibers, use a blacklight if you have one, etc. I've worked many years as a cashier, and I picked more counterfeits just by touching/handling them than I ever did w/a pen. I even had someone on a previous shift take a bill that passed a pen test, but was an obvious fake that you could even see the inkjet printing marks.
@thisheregirafFe: No, it meant that the old lady did not know the bill was a fake. The friend did, but used it anyways, to get it off his hands. Though at that time, he was not aware that its a federal offense.
UV flashlights are cheap insurance when dealing with phat stacks of cash.
What happen to all the counterfeit precautions the government has spent millions of tax payer money on to stop it. Will be going to Office Depot to buy one of those pens myself!
Eight-hundred dollars might not seem like a lot
Maybe if you're making $800 an hour.
At least he got to catch the guy that scammed him.
@Jeremy82465: Refund the amount? So I can make counterfeit bills, send them to some undefined place and receive real money in return? Why having counterfeiters been doing this all along?
How did your friend find out he'd spent a phony bill, given that you say he got away with it?
How did Phil's friend know he had a fake $100 bill? And, if knowing, why did he spend it anyway? AND, how could he have been unaware he got away with a federal offense?
Wait..."your friend" discovered the bill was counterfeit and spent it anyway? I think they're aware they got aware with a Federal offense. If they were unaware, they would never have known the bill was counterfeit.
@Jeremy82465:
it isn't "money", so there's nothing to refund when you turn it in.
There's really only one way to get rid of counterfeit money. Send it to the church of scientology as a donation.
@jazzjunkie: Yeah, but unethical isnt always illegal. Like switch and bait, and making crappy loans. Neither is immoral = illegal. And it was a 100 bucks, depending on your situation, it might fall in the "ethics be damned, im not giving up on this much money" area. Also note that it is much less unethical to pass on a fake note to someone than it is to print one, or to up-sell stuff that you know that the other person cannot afford.
@techstar25: Did you check the water marks? Sometimes the more sophisticated rings will bleach a one or five and then print a ten or twenty on top of it. Fools the pen, but not the eye.
When I worked at a bank, we used to have to seize counterfeit bills on the spot. We would also have them fill out a form and the bill was sent to the Secret Service. People would get quite angry sometimes demanding the bill back. One time someone actually tried to grab it back
@icruise:
The friend knew it was fake. He just decided to try and spend it anyway. At least that's my understanding
It's not a surprise. I've had the bank themselves give me counterfeit bills. It happens.
@hypochondriac: If we assume you're right (and you may be!), then the story reads he didn't know it wsa illegal to spend it. Which makes no sense
@WearingBlue4BillyMays_GitEmSteveDave:
I thought those were meant to react TO the bills, not react to regular paper
The seller didn't come back, the seller is the one who got scammed (your link says otherwise).
How did this friend story happen - did they not know the bill was counterfeit when they spent it, or what?
@coren: They "react" to starch on the surface being sprayed. So if you sprayed a whole bunch of bills w/spray starch, they would all appear counterfeit, which some people do in order to slip one or two past someone in a group of real bills. If a bill they know is real is showing up counterfeit, they assume the pen "went bad".
@ElPresidente408: I knew a coin dealer who would pay face value +some extra for your trouble for counterfeit bills that looked REALLY good. He was collecting them purely as "art", and not to run a counterfeiting ring.
Of course, when I was a cashier, NO ONE wanted to be holding the "hot potato".
My Dad gave me some counterfiet $20's. My brother had sold an extra Steeler's ticket outside the game & the guy paid him with them. My Dad remembered the guy having a big stack of new bills. I figure the thief used the fakes to buy tickets then resold them to get real cash. The bills were good, only the feel of the paper was slightly wrong (and when I looked it had no security strip).
@WearingBlue4BillyMays_GitEmSteveDave: Oh. Huh. I used to, and this was at least 5 years ago so who knows if it's still done, work at a place that had a pen that you made a mark on bills with, and if they reacted then you knew the bill was good, not bad.
@MostlyHarmless: I'm just saying that makes as little, if not less, sense than the other explanation
@coren: Well thats what Phil said. And it was quite clear what he meant. Now whether it makes sense or not my business.
@coren: Maybe the readers skipped reading comprehension. You'd be surprised (though one should not be) by how many people miss the point of the article, or jump over the facts stated in the article.
@MostlyHarmless: Actually, when private citizens making crappy loans, especially when the interest rate is ridiculously high, is illegal. Usury FTL! Sometimes, also, when businesses engage in bait and switches are illegal. But, I agree with you mostly.
Counterfeit markers are useless and easily defeated. The advice in the article is pretty outdated.
For the layman, the Security Thread is the best defense. For $5 bills and higher, the Security Thread glows a certain color under a 365nm UV light. As bank counters don't check this feature, even high end counterfeiters elect to ommit this feature from their counterfeit bills. Cheap 400nm UV Penlights can be bought for $5, they won't detect $100's (red) but they will work perfectly for $50's (yellow). $100's require 365nm UV light to see the red in the Security Thread. 365 UV penlights can be bought on the internet for $60 shipped.
Short of a UV penlight, the color shifting ink is the next best defense. Even high end counterfeiters tend to only make ink that "Sparkles" but doesn't actually color shift. If you get a counterfeit with color shifting ink that actually shifts color, then chances are you will spend it without ever knowing you received a counterfeit bill.
Hope this helps someone out.
One time when I was working at a gas station during college, some guy that took the shift before me took many bills that were so obviously fake it hurt my brain. He still got to keep the job! I was constantly getting yelled at for not cleaning something that I had actually cleaned (they were just dicks there, it really sucked a lot), and this dude takes a huge amount of cash that is clearly counterfeit and nothing happens. Another time I got in trouble when a co-worker of mine that was working the same graveyard shift was stole like $120 straight out of the register while I was cleaning or restocking or doing some other bullshit task. They came around yelling like crazy at me and him, until they finally checked the security tapes. They never apologized for accusing me, and I believe they actually tried to blame me anyway because I "wasn't paying attention to what he was doing." Incompetent.
A week or so later, I was checking the book that we used to count the $$ in the register before and after our shifts, and he had put down +$240. PLUS 240?? WTF, this guy was somehow making a ton of extra cash for the store? Yeeeah, I believe that, since 9/10 times you come up short by like $.25 or so (accidentally making incorrect change, but it could work in the stores benefit too obviously). I was determined to figure it out because I knew I'd somehow get blamed. So I searched the entire store and found the $240 stashed away under a printer. I put the $$ in the safe (it took like 3 separate drops just to get it all in there), wrote a note to the boss telling him the story and also to fuck off, because I quit.
That same store eventually got bulldozed and rebuilt. Then a few weeks later, bulldozed again. Then rebuilt. Then bulldozed again a couple months later. These people are seriously the stupidest people ever.
@MostlyHarmless: Ethics are absolute, something cannot be "much less unethical". It either is or it isn't.
Shouldn't Ben Bernanke be arrested, then?
@techstar25: Those counterfeit detector markers are largely a scam. The ink in them contains iodine, which turns purple in the presence of starch (as opposed to the yellow stain of iodine). Plain paper contains starch, unlike the rag paper that real money is printed on, but it is quite simple to just feel the difference, not to mention notice the red and blue silk fibers, among other things.
Those pens are a waste of $5, and give a false sense of security to those who use them.
Can someone correct me if I am wrong. I was told many moons ago that if you receive counterfeit money, you can deduct the amount of money taken by the Secret Service off your taxes as a loss or there was a special form for it.