Phony greenbacks surfacing in Palmer

KATE GOLDEN/Frontiersman reporter

What's green and feels funny? More importantly, where did it come from?

A counterfeit $100 bill that arrived at the Palmer branch of Wells Fargo bank last week was discovered by the teller who received it and sent on to the U.S. Secret Service.

"Palmer has been hit heavily with counterfeit hundreds," said Sue Welton, Palmer branch manager of First National Bank Alaska, in an e-mail warning to the Greater Palmer Chamber of Commerce.

Phony greenbacks seen recently in Palmer have been one-dollar bills bleached and reprinted as $100s. Since they're on U.S. Treasury currency paper, they pass the pen test, which marks real currency with a distinctive color.

"You can't necessarily rely on those counterfeit detection pens," Mac Whisler, resident agent at the Secret Service in Anchorage, said, urging businesses to check their money carefully.

New bills have a lot of easily detectable security features, such as color-shifting ink, watermarks in the paper, large portraits and micro-printing, small lettering that's not easily reproduced.

"The older bills do have really good printing," Whisler said.

There's always a stream of counterfeit money coming in from businesses and banks to the Anchorage office, which covers the entire state.

"We get between a few hundred to a few thousand a month in our office," Whisler said. "And every now and then there's an upsurge. We don't know why," he said. Twenties are more common than $100s. Certain times of the year - particularly during Christmas - there are more cases everywhere.

And there's been a change in the industry in the last few years. New-fangled digital printers render counterfeiting accessible to the common man. The old-fashioned way - printing bills on actual presses, as it's done at the government mint - produces a much higher quality note.

It's easier to identify a digitally produced fake, Whisler said. "It isn't as crisp. It's a little blurry, compared to a real bill."

In 2001, 39 percent of the $47.5 million in counterfeit money that came into circulation was computer generated, compared with 0.5 percent in 1995, according to Secret Service statistics.

During the Civil War, one-third to one-half of the currency in circulation was fake, according to the Secret Service Web site.

The service was founded in 1865 to address the problem.

Suspect you've been handed a fake? The Secret Service says: Don't return the bill to the passer, and try to delay him or her. Note the passer's physical description, companions and car license-plate numbers. Write your initials and the date in the white border of the bill, try not to handle it and keep it in an envelope. Call the local police or the Secret Service.

Know your money: http://www.secretservice.gov/know_your_money.shtml.