Druggie came by my office, wanted to sell me 2 - $10 bills for $4. I inspected them and knowing they were counterfeit , the only way I could tell is the serial #'s were the same. I did not think it was worth the time and trouble to fake a $10 bill. Finally I pry the whole story out of the guy. Drug dealer in Houston gets quite a few counterfeit bills,,, the last thing he wants is the feds after him for counterfeit ---------- so he gives them away to a friend, who proceeds to sell them for 10 cents on the dollar.
This druggie brags to me that the most he has ever made in one day is $2800 with them. It was 4th of July, he drove round trip to Houston and stopped at every fireworks stand and bought $20 worth of fireworks --- normally teenagers or similar are working --paid with $100 bill and got $80 change in real money. He got back with a car load of fireworks and $2800 in real money.
Of course this is stealing, but I guess the moral of the story is where there is a will, there is a way.

I bet authorities would like A tip off...

Secret Service. They handle that.

Paying a drug dealer in fake money is a quick way to end yourself.

North Korea was making fake 100 that were better quality than the US Mints

That was the reason you saw the $100 redesigned like 2 times just a few years ago

I know a guy that has 2 browning safes full of the old 100 bills......pre strip.

You know what the strips are for?

Democrat?

Yeah I know a kid who did something similar thinking it was kind of a lark - and he’s about 1/3 of the way through an 8 year term in the federal pen right now.

Ouch. And good to go for the law. All counterfeiting does is drive up prices. I remember being in a vault and there was a pile of money over by a desk. $700G. All counterfeit. Some of it was just terrible looking, like a printer copy of a $100 with the corners cut off taped to a $1 bill. Others looked so good it took an expert to tell the difference.

Did you call the police?

I have some ocean front property in Arizona.

Excellent question

Police probably wouldn't mess with it, They would say it's a federal matter

It's actually a third degree felony in Texas and they absolutely would mess with it.

I have seen probably 25-35 kids locked up due to counterfeiting. They take it very serious. Some of the bills look like kids copied them off a printer and some looked very real.

Probably 15 years ago me and Dad walked into a Mcdonalds and he paid with a $10 bill. The manager who was training a new employee handed the bill back to my Dad and told him it was fake and then told the new trainee she needed to learn to spot stuff like that. I laughed and told Dad she was not suppose to give it back to him if it was fake. I got a bill pen from Dollar Tree to check the bill and it was real as real could get.

Back in the nineties printers were really good and there was a lot of competition among the manufacturers to get better.
Then copying and printing money started happening so the .gov stepped in.

Look it up

Worse than a Hot Check!

Yepper..........I gots a cannon 500 printer too and not a 550.......

Back in the early 90’s some high school kids decided to print some bills and started passing them off throughout the town and through friends. They set up shop in a apartment that they had rented and were busted when they ordered a pizza and the delivery guy noticed the apartment had no furniture and the printer. I believe they paid him with counterfeit bills and the Secret Service was already on their trail. They threw the printer in a local lake but it was found and it didn’t end well for them.

The bills that have the corners cut off and have a twenty or fifty taped on are called coiled bills. Some can be done real well and the thought process is that the clerk will just look at the denomination in the end of the bill and not the portrait on the bill and give the change for that amount.

Can you show me the Penal Code for that?

Hot check is up to the District Attorney in each county will decide whether or not to pursue it, I have dealt with hot checks before.

Sure. Here you go. I've only added the parts applying to money, but you can see the entire statute here. https://codes.findlaw.com/tx/penal-code/penal-sect-32-21.html

No, you don't have to actually be the one that forged it.

Texas PC 32.21 Forgery

(a) For purposes of this section:

(1) “Forge” means:

(A) to alter, make, complete, execute, or authenticate any writing so that it purports:

(i) to be the act of another who did not authorize that act;

(ii) to have been executed at a time or place or in a numbered sequence other than was in fact the case;  or

(iii) to be a copy of an original when no such original existed;

(B) to issue, transfer, register the transfer of, PASS, publish, or otherwise utter a writing that is forged within the meaning of Paragraph (A);  or

(C) to POSSESS a writing that is forged within the meaning of Paragraph (A) WITH INTENT to utter it in a manner specified in Paragraph (B).

(2) “Writing” includes:

(B) MONEY, coins, tokens, stamps, seals, credit cards, badges, and trademarks;  and

(b) A person commits an offense if he forges a writing with intent to defraud or harm another.

(e) Subject to Subsection (e-1), an offense under this section is a felony of the third degree if the writing is or purports to be:

(1) part of an issue of MONEY, securities, postage or revenue stamps;

In other words, if you alter OR pass, or possess with the intent to pass, fake money, then you have committed a third degree felony, aka Forgery.