Customs and Border Patrol officers in Minnesota seize $900G in counterfeit bills from Chinese shipping container

Fox News ^ | 01/27/2020 | Danielle Wallace

[SeekAndFind]

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers in Minnesota discovered $900,000 in counterfeit $1 bills inside a shipping container originating from China, the agency said in a press release Monday.

CBP officers had referred a rail container for a Customs Exam Station inspection on Dec. 14 at the International Falls Port of Entry, which connects the cities of International Falls, Minn., and Fort Frances, Ontario, Canada.

While inspecting the container Friday, CBP officers found 45 cartons of possible counterfeit currency in the form of $1 bills with a total face value of $900,000. The U.S. Secret Service was contacted and determined the currency is counterfeit, the press release said.

“CBP officers strive every day to protect the United States from a variety of threats,” Jason Schmelz, Pembina Area Port Director, said in a statement. “Those threats don’t always come in the form of terrorists or narcotics, but also in the form of counterfeit currency and other goods that have the potential to harm the economy of the United States.

“Thanks to the dedication of our officers and our partnership with the Secret Service, we were able to keep this currency from entering into circulation.”

The CBP said stopping the flow of counterfeit merchandise, including counterfeit currency, is a priority trade issue for the agency in order to minimize its negative impact on the U.S. economy.

[RedMonqey]

Dollar bills? Wow. I’ve often heard counterfeiters like the big bills such as $100, $50, and $20.

I heard a while back that making counterfeit bills less than a ten isn't economical sound nor worth the jail time. Dunno how they came up with this factoid. Guess everything IS cheaper in China.

[faucetman]

Makes ZERO sense to counterfeit ONE dollar bills.

If you bought something for say even $80, you would draw unwanted attention to yourself and the bills counting out EIGHTY bills!

The only way to not get caught, would be to spend them exclusively on lap dances.

[Spktyr]

Maybe want to check those to see if they’ve been treated with the current coronavirus - or anything else.

[hanamizu]

During WWII the Germans produced what seemed like perfect pound notes. The Bank of England caught them almost immediately but I have no idea how.

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I think it was the £5 note and that they were so good that the B of E had to go to great lengths to differentiate the genuine from the counterfeits. Supposedly there a a bunch of them at the bottom of some lake in Austria.

[chajin]

Makes ZERO sense to counterfeit ONE dollar bills.

Go to 4,500 non-chain convenience stores (about 100 per state, easy to find), give them each 200 $1 bills for $100, let the stores spread them into circulation. With connections with cartels/gangs, it would be very easy.

[billyboy15]

Try and buy a $100 item with 100 brand new $1.00 bills and watch what happens.

[Kickass Conservative]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mister_880

[battousai]

Its probably fake money used for burning, a form of joss paper, and not actual counterfeit... sometimes called 'hell money' in the west.

Hell money

[Oatka]

It would take some time, but go to Vegas or any place where there’s more than one casino. Pump those dollar bills in a slot machine. Play a game or two and cash out - you get a voucher that can be traded in for real money.

[norwaypinesavage]

It’s 4 degrees F right now in International Falls. I wonder how they can deal with all that cold cash!

[Sirius Lee]

Infected with Corona, yes that is a nightmare scenario. I have no idea whether the virus can survive long outside of a host, but if this was an engineered bioweapon then it figures that some of the Chinese handling the weapon, not knowing its true nature would have helped themselves to some USDs and infected themselves.

Maybe the shipment was originally a million, not 900k.

[alfa6]

See here regards German counterfitting

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Bernhard

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

[yarddog]

Interesting.

It sounds like counterfeiting perfect notes was way more difficult than one would think. Also contrary to what I have read, they were not immediately caught and some probably never were.

Especially interesting was the ones recovered from a lake and examined by British expert who declared them perfect.

[spokeshave]

And the idiots stuck a sample on the outside of one of the boxes....

[spokeshave]

And the idiots stuck a sample on the outside of one of the boxes....

[Valpal1]

What about using them in vending or cash machines. Somebody had a specific use in mind I am sure.

[Svartalfiar]

Ones? 900,000 ones? I guess that they figured they could pawn them off easily because no one bothers to check a $1 bill to see if it is counterfeit.

No one checks fives or tens either. Twentys, maybe. But Ones is just dumb, you get ten times the profit (at basically the same risk) if you run ten-dollar bills!