Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
CENTERVILLE — Police arrested three people Thursday suspected of making counterfeit money.
Officers checking on two suspicious people in a parking lot at Target, 200 N. Market Place Drive, found marijuana, methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia in their rented car, police said. Store employees said the pair was suspected to have passed counterfeit money at a Target in Cottonwood Heights.
According to police, the car contained nine $1 bills that had been chemically washed and reprinted to look like $100 bills. Among the signs they were fake were watermarks of George Washington instead of Benjamin Franklin, said Centerville Police Lt. Paul Child.
How the real bills are made is a government secret, but counterfeiters like to convert them instead of making fake ones from scratch so the feel of the paper is correct, Child said.
The car contained expensive items including a new TV and stereo believed to have been purchased with counterfeit bills, he said, as well as a laptop computer and printer.
Christina Y. Duran, 27, and Rudy Luevano, 22, both of Bakersfield, Calif., were arrested, along with a 17-year-old girl listed as a runaway from California. They are also suspects in passing counterfeit money in West Jordan.
Duran and Luevano are charged in 2nd District Court with drug possession, and Duran is charged with possession of a forgery device, a third-degree felony.
Email:pkoepp@ksl.com
