Fake silver bars unknowingly sold by area businesses

A Portage Township man has been arrested for selling fake silver bars to area jewelry stores.

Thomas Damon, 23, of Portage Township, was arrested for felony theft and misdemeanor false informing after allegedly selling high-quality fakes of silver bars to numerous area jewelry stores and pawnshops.

Police made the arrest about 1:58 p.m. Tuesday at The Estate, 3101 Willowcreek Road, when Damon returned to the store to sell more fake silver.

The owner told police that over the previous weeks, he had paid Damon $825 for 50 bars of metal, which were in cases and bore federal government stamps, and which Damon initially said he inherited.

On Monday, another unwitting buyer and seller of the fake silver, the owner of Engstrom Jewelers in Valparaiso, notified The Estate and other area businesses Damon’s “silver” was thinly coated brass.

Similar 1-ounce bars are available online for $2.30 each, while real ones are worth $16 to $18 each, according to the police report.

During his arrest, police said, Damon also admitted to selling fake bars to Pawn King and Bunch Jewelers in Portage, and to Ameripawn in Lake Station. The only business that supposedly discovered the fraud in time to avoid making a purchase was Indiana Pawn Shop of Lake Station, which used a scanner to check the metal’s validity, police said.

The business owners police spoke to said they were in the process of contacting customers to give refunds.