I'm Not Making This Up
The Dallas Morning News reports that the Secret Service has busted a Dallas-area tract house--not a suburban ranch but a religious ministry printing evangelical materials. The suspected crime: counterfeiting. The evidence: fake $1,000,000 bills (a denomination that doesn't exist). The DMN's Donna Fielder describes them:
The fake bills are the same size as U.S. currency. They have the distinctive peach and green coloring of new $20 bills and appear to carry the Department of the Treasury and U.S. Federal Reserve seals. But the Treasury seal reads, "Thou shalt not steal."
The back of the bill also looks like the $20 bill, but around the edges are admonitions against looking at a woman with lust and other sins, and repentance is urged.
According to federal Web sites, the largest bill printed is a $100,000 bill, but it circulates only among Federal Reserve banks. Grover Cleveland's picture, which appears on the $1 million religious tracts, actually appears on the $1,000 bill.
Nobody has been arrested, but the counterfeiting cops did seize the group's inventory and may issue a formal "cease and desist" order later this week.