Posted on 04/07/2005 2:46:06 PM PDT by TitansAFC
A man trying to pay a fee using $2 bills was arrested, handcuffed and taken to jail after clerks at a Best Buy store questioned the currency's legitimacy and called police.
According to an account in the Baltimore Sun, 57-year-old Mike Bolesta was shocked to find himself taken to the Baltimore County lockup in Cockeysville, Md., where he was handcuffed to a pole for three hours while the U.S. Secret Service was called to weigh in on the case.
Bolesta told the Sun: "I am 6 feet 5 inches tall, and I felt like 8 inches high. To be handcuffed, to have all those people looking on, to be cuffed to a pole – and to know you haven't done anything wrong. And me, with a brother, Joe, who spent 33 years on the city police force. It was humiliating."
After Best Buy personnel reportedly told Bolesta he would not be charged for the installation of a stereo in his son's car, he received a call from the store saying it was in fact charging him the fee. As a means of protest, Bolesta decided to pay the $114 bill using 57 crisp, new $2 bills.
As the owner of Capital City Student Tours, the Baltimore resident has a hearty supply of the uncommon currency. He often gives the bills to students who take his tours for meal money.
"The kids don't see that many $2 bills, so they think this is the greatest thing in the world," Bolesta says. "They don't want to spend 'em. They want to save 'em. I've been doing this since I started the company. So I'm thinking, 'I'll stage my little comic protest. I'll pay the $114 with $2 bills.'"
Bolesta explained what happened when he presented the bills to the cashier at Best Buy Feb. 20.
"She looked at the $2 bills and told me, 'I don't have to take these if I don't want to.' I said, 'If you don't, I'm leaving. I've tried to pay my bill twice. You don't want these bills, you can sue me.' So she took the money – like she's doing me a favor."
Belesta says the cashier marked each bill with a pen. Other store employees began to gather, a few of them asking, "Are these real?"
"Of course they are," Bolesta said. "They're legal tender."
According to the Sun report, the police arrest report noted one employee noticed some smearing of ink on the bills. That's when the cops were called. One officer reportedly noticed the bills ran in sequential order.
Said Bolesta: "I told them, 'I'm a tour operator. I've got thousands of these bills. I get them from my bank. You got a problem, call the bank.' I'm sitting there in a chair. The store's full of people watching this. All of a sudden, he's standing me up and handcuffing me behind my back, telling me, 'We have to do this until we get it straightened out.'
"Meanwhile, everybody's looking at me. I've lived here 18 years. I'm hoping my kids don't walk in and see this. And I'm saying, 'I can't believe you're doing this. I'm paying with legal American money.'"
Bolesta was taken to the lockup, where he sat handcuffed to a pole and in leg irons while the Secret Service was called.
"At this point," he says, "I'm a mass murderer."
Secret Service agent Leigh Turner eventually arrived and declared the bills legitimate, adding, according to the police report, "Sometimes ink on money can smear."
Commenting on the incident, Baltimore County police spokesman Bill Toohey told the Sun: "It's a sign that we're all a little nervous in the post-9/11 world."
Then he'll go through this all over again, as a known $2 bill-passer.
Once you get stuck in a Seinfeldian category like "low talker" or "$2 bill-passer", you'll never get out of it.
Chuck E Cheese bump.
Got one of those in change a couple of weeks ago and had to clean it up with Brasso just so people wouldn't think I was trying to pass something off on them.
Other than the man arrested and the Secret Service folks, everyone involved in this incident is just too unfathomably stupid to be permitted to waste oxygen any longer.
Stupidity at this level ought to be a capital crime.
They sure were bad luck for this guy.
http://www.frbsf.org/currency/expansion/notes/s28.html
If ignorance of the law is no excuse for private citizens, it likewise shouldn't be an allowable excuse for police officers.
The large-denomination bills - $500, $1000, $5000, $10000 - were issued to the public until 1969, although printing stopped during the Second World War and they've been phasing out of circulation ever since. The $5000 bill and lower are in fact still legal tender, and must be accepted accordingly. The $10000 bill is no longer legal tender, but can be exchanged (for Bennies!) at a bank once authenticated. It was only the $100,000 bill that was strictly for transfers between Federal Reserve banks. Come up with one of those, and you'll be calling Leavenworth home. =)
I once got into an argument with a sales clerk over the Susan B.'s. She told me they weren't legal tender. Idiots abound!
(In best R. Lee Ermey voice)
YOU GOTTA BE F----- KIDDING ME!
What a bunch for flippin' idiots.
He'll have to register with the 2-dollar bill passers' database too.
I saw a guy pass a Slick Times Three-Dollar-Bill at a Pizza Hut. Cashier took it without a second thought.
That is going to be one rich customer. I'll bet Best Buy wishes they'd let the whole installation thing slide.
They got their $114 bucks.
At a few million in legal fees and settlement funds.
I think you meant to say "With all those people with the nerve to think they are free enough to carry large sums of money around without the government knowing about it..."
They're a little nervous, but they're big-time stupid.
Best Buy needed to fire the clerk and give this guy a $1,000 gift certificate.
$2 bills are always given as change at the gift shop at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home in Charlottesville, Virginia.
I hsve several of those 1976 vintage $2 bills although I do vaguely remember the old ones with Monticello on the back when I was real little. I also have some silver certificates, wonder if they are worth anything?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.