Crime Doesn't Pay, Except Maybe When It's Counterfeiting Money

Have you guys noticed an influx of counterfeit money in the city?

I don't know if this is a legit thing happening, or if there's always been a lot of fake money around and it's only new to my radar. All I know is I have seen a lot more counterfeit money over the past few months in the Bushwick/Bed-Stuy/Crown Heights area than seems normal.

My initial reaction is Sweet! I hope I'm witnessing some awesome plot that can make my life slightly more reminiscent of movies like Blow or... Blank Check? Classic.

But wait! It turns out having a bunch of counterfeit money around is exceedingly annoying. Last time I got a fake $10, it took me a while to notice. (This, despite the fact that it was perfectly crisp and clean, marked 1950, and had a lopsided outer border by a margin of about 1/8". I am clearly not a big-time money handler.)

I ended up fumbling with it in an MTA ticket machine for 15 minutes before coming to the conclusion the machine was broken, then almost got accosted by a cab driver for trying to give him the fake bill. "I didn't know! But thanks for the tip. I'm an idiot. This is clearly a fake ten. Good night, sir."

But now what am I supposed to do?! I ain't got no monies, yo. I was just an innocent victim given a worthless ten. Starbucks can handle this issue much better than I, I thought, so I slipped it over to a hapless cashier and went on my way.

But wait! It turns out that sometimes you are not so lucky pawning off those bills. In fact, sometimes when you don't even know you're pawning off one of those bills, you can get handcuffed on the spot and sent down to the precinct.

Case in point: my superintendent went to buy a new lock at the hardware store with a fake twenty, and the store owner called the cops. Now he's sitting in some hole of a cell with a bunch of other dudes, fighting over who gets to use the toilet, and I'm sitting here in my apartment with no lock on my front door. (Attention all robbers and thieves: please don't come to my apartment building today.)

Did my super know it was a fake twenty? According to him, no. I guess in a purely technical sense the truth is 50/50--but it doesn't even matter.

I didn't notice my ten at first, and was flinging that thing around all careless and whimsy free. What if I had gone into that hardware store? Would I be jet setting to a weekend in the slammer?

And how about when I did know? I still needed that money! At that point, I had just been officially robbed, but in a much worse way than actually being robbed. What am I going to do, tell the cops? Best case scenario, they take the money. Worst case scenario, they arrest me for having counterfeit money.

This is a lose-lose situation, folks, and I find it upsetting.

What's more upsetting is a question that must be brought up:
Is it more likely that my 30-something West Caribbean superintendent would immediately get sent to jail for using a fake bill than me? Methinks the answer is yes. And methinks this is a great misfortune. And methinks that maybe that is a bit of a counterfeit money pun.

I open the floor to you. But meanwhile... dun dun dunnn.... I think I may have found the culprits:

Looks like this problem just got a whole lot cuter.

I bet it's these sneaky kittens who own this sketchy safety deposit box in Long Island filled with counterfeit money. It's always those god damn cats. And it's always god damn Long Island, amirite?

For more, a list of 10 famous counterfeiting schemes in the 1900s. Spoiler alert: it ends with a woman who was burned at the stake for counterfeiting, after being hung. I repeat: they hung her, and then they burned her dead body. That is a harsh one. You kittens better watch out.

Moral of the story: check your bills, son.