Posted on 08/04/2005 3:51:33 AM PDT by Jet Jaguar
When James Sweeney cashed a $4,700 check at Key Bank after selling a trailer, it didn't occur to him to check the bills. After all, the money came straight from the bank's vault.
It's a mistake the 24-year-old heavy duty mechanic will never make again.
Sweeney took the cash to his financial institution, Credit Union 1, to deposit. A teller there pulled out a counterfeit $100 bill, he said.
When Sweeney returned to Key Bank less than a half hour later, the bank refused to replace the bill, saying its liability ended when Sweeney walked out the door.
Most other banks would do the same, said David Lawer, past president of the Alaska Bankers Association and senior vice president and general counsel for First National Bank Alaska.
"It's difficult to confirm that they got the bill from you," he said.
The counterfeit bill has since been turned over to the U.S. Secret Service, which investigates such matters.
The bill fell into Sweeney's hands on May 21 at the College Road branch of Key Bank, Sweeney said. When the buyer of his trailer paid with a check, he went to Key Bank to make sure the person had the funds, he said. It was about 1:45 p.m., or 15 minutes before the bank's closing time.
When the Key Bank teller confirmed the funds' availability, Sweeney decided to cash the check. He watched a supervisor go to the bank's vault to obtain packets of $100 bills, he said.
When the supervisor returned with the money, the teller counted out 46 of the bills three times with the supervisor looking on, Sweeney said. The teller counted the final $95--Key Bank charged a $5 check-cashing fee--from her drawer, he said. Then she put the excess $100s from the vault into her drawer.
"I gathered up the money and put it into a Key Bank money envelope," Sweeney said. "I didn't look at the money until I got to my bank, which is Credit Union 1 on University (Avenue)."
A teller there counted the money once and found the bogus bill, Sweeney said.
"As soon as I laid my hands on it, it was like, that is definitely fake," he said.
A Fairbanks Police officer who investigated the incident described the bill as "rather blurry."
"None of the security features were present at all," said the officer, Matt Soden.
Like 90 percent of the of bogus bills turned over to the Secret Service in Anchorage every month--the average is about $1,000 worth--the bill appeared to have been created on a color or laser printer.
The manager at Credit Union 1 suggested Sweeney return to Key Bank with the faux currency. He did and the bank was closed, so Sweeney banged on the door to attract an employee, a woman.
"She denied I got it from their bank," he said. "I'm kind of sympathetic to them, but this is an honest situation. I showed back up to the bank 20 minutes later. At least give me the benefit of the doubt. I was just there."
On the following Monday, Sweeney filed a police report.
Soden interviewed Key Bank officials, who told the officer they didn't think the bill came from them. Bank tellers are trained to spot counterfeit bills by sight and touch, and the bank has money-counting machines that detect fake currency, according to Debi Sakamoto, Key Bank's Western region spokeswoman.
"There are a tremendous amount of steps," she said.
With no evidence of wrongdoing--aside from tracking down whoever printed the counterfeit bill--the Fairbanks Police Department has closed the investigation.
"At this point, it's between (Sweeney) and Key Bank," Soden said. "Key Bank feels that their security is such that the counterfeit bill did not come from them. There's no indication that there was any criminal activity.
"I don't have an explanation for how he wound up with the counterfeit bill," Soden added. "I don't see any gain that he would have by taking a counterfeit hundred over there."
Mac Whisler, resident agent for the Secret Service, was unable to comment on the possible origin of Sweeney's bill, but, he added, a majority of the counterfeit money circulating in Alaska is made in Alaska.
Other financial institutions sympathized with Key Bank.
"People have become so sophisticated in committing fraud against financial institutions that we are all overly cautious," said Nancy Bear Usera, spokeswoman for Alaska USA Federal Credit Union.
Jim Forkel, operations officer for Denali State Bank, said his bank would have to investigate a claim like Sweeney's.
"If somebody left my institution and came back later and said I presented them with a counterfeit bill, how would you prove I did or I didn't?" he said. "I don't know that I would outright exchange it with another bill."
Obtaining counterfeit money from a bank is a rare occurrence, but not impossible, said Lawer, the Alaska Bankers Association official. "We all train our tellers in detecting counterfeit bills. But, you know, it's not a full-proof system," Lawer said.
Reporter Amanda Bohman can be reached at abohman@newsminer.com or 459-7544.
I will from now on. But what about the drive-thrus and the money machines?
Did I read that he cashed the check 15 mins before closing and then returned 20 mins later? Hmmm.
Yeah, it's eaither a color printer or a laser printer - hard to tell which...
Sorry. Read it more carefully. Now I understand how he got back in.
Good point. SOL?
I doubt that's what he said.
I think he cashed check at bank and then tried to deposit cash at credit union. Not sure why he didn't deposit check at credit union. Seems like a lot a trouble to go through.
So they're not merely saying it isn't their problem -- they're accusing Sweeney of being a liar. Nice.
I don't necessarily believe this guy. He could have slipped a fake one in there and hope his credit union doesn't spot it, and if they do, "Oh, it came from Key Bank".
This kind of crap is pulled all over the place.
Why did this guy get bundles of cash and not a cashier's check?
Agree.. This is suspicious.. I don't believe this guy at all.
There's no reason why he couldn't take his check straight to his credit union.
I believe his logic was that he went to the purchaser's bank to confirm that the the funds were available in the guy's checking account right then. He then decided to cash the check there to be sure that the guy didn't draw down the account before the check cleared, i.e. make a few ATM withdrawals which would later cause the check to bounce at his credit union.
He went to the buyer's bank to verify the funds. More than likely he did not have an account there, thus the $5 fee for cashing the check. Banks (and credit unions) will allow a non-member to cash a check if it's one of the banks' own checks.
Once threw a $100 bill in with an ATM deposit envelope at Citibank. They claimed it wasn't there when the envelope was opened and that they had cameras trained on the people opening the envelopes.
Despite being a former Citicorp employee and a customer in good standing for over a dozen years, it took a good deal or arguing to get them to credit me the money.
I don't think the bank is saying he is a liar. The bank is just saying their responsibility ends when he left the bank. I don't know what the law says.
I have done something similar with money of that amount. Here is why it makes sense:
1. The check was drawn on the bank in question. Not being in the retail business, whenever I've taken a check, large or small, at a yard sale or other opportunity, I've gone to the bank it was drawn on to verify that the money is actually there and to get it into my possession as soon as possible.
2. Going to that bank meant he could get the money immediately. If he merely deposited the money at the credit union, there would be an automatic hold on it and it wouldn't be available to him until it cleared. If the writer of the check just happened to process another check before the credit union completed its transaction with the bank such that the account was overdrawn even by a small amount, the bank would not honor the check.
Those making accusations that the accuser's actions were suspicious must never have taken a bad check and had to take extra steps to get even a fraction of the money. I sold a car once and the check bounced. It cost me 1/3 of the amount of the sale to have a collection agency get the money.
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