Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Housekeeper finds counterfeiting operation
A housekeeper at a hotel just off Interstate 95 is being credited with alerting authorities to a counterfeit cash and identity operation that investigators say has links to similar schemes across the state.
At a press conference carried on Facebook Thursday, St. Lucie County Sheriff Ken Mascara said managers at the Hilton Garden Inn notified officials Tuesday night after the housekeeper entered a room to clean it and noticed a computer, printing equipment and other supplies that suggested moneyprinting was taking place.
A second printer found in the room was used to make fake identification cards, investigators said.
Eventually, detectives and personnel from the Secret Service found more than 20 counterfeit bills in $100, $50 and $20 denominations.
“These counterfeits were very sophisticated and, in fact, were not detected by the standard counterfeit pen used by most merchants,” Mascara said.
Search warrants were obtained for the two hotel rooms reserved by the same person and — as the searches were being conducted — three people linked to the rooms drove into the hotel’s parking lot. They were all arrested.
One of the three, Christopher Tucker Bertany, 30, admitted that he stayed in the room with the printing equipment, Mascara said, “and admitted to printing between $3,000 and $4,000 in counterfeit currency and passed more than $1,000 in St. Lucie County alone.”
Bertany is facing several charges including having tools for forgery and counterfeiting.
The two people with him admitted to reserving the hotel rooms using a fake name, but denied any knowledge of the counterfeiting operation, Mascara said.
They are facing various drug-related charges after drug paraphernalia and methamphetamine were found in the second room, officials said.
“The Secret Service has also identified more than $10,000 in counterfeit currency in a case from Jacksonville area as well as other cases in the Orlando area that can be tied back to Bertany,” Mascara said.
Experts say there are ways to spot counterfeit currency, among them:
■ Make sure the color shifting ink on the bill’s bottom right corner changes as you rotate the bill;
■ The bill should have raised printing that can be detected when magnified;
■ Blurry borders, printing or text should be a red flag because authentic bills are extremely detailed;
■ Legitimate cash has small red and blue threads woven in and out within the bill’s fabric;
■ Look at the bill’s watermark: it should only be visible when the money is held up to the light and it should only be on the right side of the bill;
■ The bill’s serial number should match the series/ run year on the bill. Each letter that starts a serial number for a bill corresponds to a specific year.