KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Fake purses, fake jewelry and fake furs. In the current tough economy, many fakes in fashion at not a faux paux like they once used to be.
But one particular fake is always out of style with law abiding consumers.
Each year, thousands of dollars in counterfeit bills circulate in the metro.
An NBC Action News investigation reveals how businesses as well as consumers often get stuck holding bogus bills.
“$310, 000 passed”
Creating counterfeit cash is now big business for a variety of reasons.
“Last year we had about $310, 000 passed,” said Chuck Green of the U.S. Secret Service.
The same guys who protect the president are on to counterfeiters and the tricks of their illegal trade. Green is based in Kansas City.
“We used to search for one counterfeiter producing a million dollars worth of counterfeit money now we are searching for a million people producing one dollar in counterfeit,” said Green.
Victims Stuck Holding Bogus Bills
If you think you won’t get stuck holding a counterfeit bill, think again. Fourteen year old Nikhil Patel wanted to earn some extra cash so he held a garage sale. But he got stuck holding two fake $100 bills.
"When he handed it to me, it kind of felt funny like a sheet of paper,” Patel said.
The number of counterfeit crimes has exploded.
In Missouri so far this year alone, federal authorities busted three people in Eastern Missouri last month for conspiracy to pass counterfeit money.
Over the past few months, phony bills have wound up in businesses in Lee's Summit, Jefferson County and Columbia.
Columbia is where bogus $100 dollar bills surfaced in six businesses.
Radio Shack employee Ryan Keller said, "It looked just like any other hundred dollar bill, but it turns out it was counterfeit."
Investigators believe the crooks washed $5 dollar bills and reprinted them to look like $100 bills.
Counterfeiters have pulled off that technique in Kansas City too.
“We did have a case here recently where people were taking five dollar bills and bleaching them down," Green said.
