Get on the ground. You're face down. Do not move. She's not going to talk. What? She's not going to talk about it. She said she don't even know that girl over there. Full of Yeah. Don't do it. Don't do it. Get on the ground. At some point in their lives, most people have been scammed. A lot of scams are so well planned that it's quite easy to fall for them. But then there are scams that are so poorly planned that they usually end badly. And the moment they're exposed, that's when cops serve instant karma to scammers. I don't know if I can get in here. I've got you. I'm just reporting you. Okay. On January 23rd, 2024, officers responded to a local Firestone store due to a reported fraud. A customer had paid with a bad check and was refusing to take care of the issue. While he did say he'd find a different form of payment, it never happened. and we got the copy of his insufficient check fund and we tried to for weeks get it straight with him. The main problem is is he don't want to pay the insufficient check fee. There is a fee for me getting a bad check. We want to charge him $20 for that. It's just the way it is. He's been saying he's going to send me a money order for two weeks. His bill was 25814. wrote us a check and for 25821 I don't know why it's ours and it bounced back for insufficient bonds and uh I got a hold of him and he says uh it's our fault the bank's fault not his fault and he'll send us a money order after we argued with him and he said he sent us a money order money order never came and that's how that's going to resolve the issue officers contacted the customer and asked him to come into the store and pay the outstanding $278.14 14. Sure, that's not exactly nothing, but neither is it enough to commit fraud for. And on top of that, most businesses are more than willing to arrange a payment plan or come up with a different solution. But they're definitely not a charity, so they'll try and get that payment no matter what. 27814 receipt. Yep. Yep. 1 minute. Thank you. Yeah. I'll hang out till he gets his receipt, then I'll I'll take out of here. How you doing? Pretty decent so far today. We live over one minute. Yeah. So, what kind of business do you have? It's uh transportation taxi. All right. I service a lot of the airport. All actually all of them. All the way from Miami up. Jeez, that's a lot of driving. It is a lot of driving. This baby's got 27,000 miles on it. 27,000. Yeah. Still runs like a new car. Yeah. Take care of them. They do. There's some things going on with these guys. I'm an investigator with Department of Justice. Pretty much done on purpose. Okay. It seemed like a closed case until this guy opened his mouth with another case of his own. The suspect, who finally paid off his bill, would have been good to go after the employee returned with his receipt. Instead, the 80-year-old decided to claim that he wrote the bad checks on purpose as part of his undercover investigation. Who do you work for? Department of Justice. You have an ID and credentials. do your task. Yeah. Just curious. Okay. Do you have your ID with you as well? You're not allowed to carry it. That's it. You're not allowed to carry an ID? Nope. Just my regular Oh, you want my personal ID? Yeah, sure. Oh, I can show you my driver's license. Yeah, if you got it. I hope so. Please don't say anything to him. Okay, that's me. And how long you been working for them? 51 years, man. 51 years, man. All right. And you don't carry ID? You're not allowed to carry an not allowed to carry paper ID. Okay, I'll we'll have a finish the conversation when he leaves. Yeah. Now, if those claims seem a little far-fetched, that's because they are still not entirely clear what scam this guy's trying to run here. There isn't a cop in the world who'd believe that someone works for the Department of Justice but isn't allowed to carry official ID. Guys like this are the reason why official ID exists in the first place. Gave me 300. Huh? Got change back there. You gave me 300. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Sorry I had to go to this way. I didn't expect it to be like that. The dad's probably turning over in his grave. So Oh, yeah. He's looking at you wondering why you're doing that. No, he is. I don't know who you're dealing with. All right, guys. Texting me all that. Thank you, buddy. Anyways, yeah, I'm not familiar. Department of what now? And justice. Department of Justice. All right. I've been all over the world, man. And what is I've never seen that badge before. Can I see that again? No. It's very cool. I've had that badge since 1978. Wow. Can I see that again? See how nice? Yeah, that was pretty cool. Now, is this law enforcement? Yeah, Department of Justice. Oh, okay. I was just curious. See the world up here? Oh, wow. That's gold. Oh, okay. What? Uh, kind of pretty, isn't it? I've never heard of it before. There's a good reason this officer has never heard of a badge like this before. Presumably, he's only ever dealt with actual government ID. And who knows where this guy got this trinket from. If he's falsely claiming to work for the US government, he's committing a much more serious crime than just writing a bad check. You're from Sarasota, right? Charlotte. Oh, yeah. Charlotte, yeah, I know a few of the guys up in Sarasota. Oh, okay. Who do you know up there? Uh, John, I don't know. It's in my paperwork. Oh, I got you. I have to keep paperwork on there. Okay. Yeah, I got you. Oh, yeah. If you wouldn't mind, just hold tight. I'm going to update this call and I'll come chat with you for a second. Then you Okay. Yeah. The technique he just tried is called cold reading and it's used by psychics, fortune tellers, and mediums all the time. He was hoping the cop would reply with something like, "Oh, John Smith. Yeah, I know him." That way, the cop provides the information while thinking the scammer knew it all the time. Unfortunately for this scammer, it didn't work. The Department of Justice now, they gave you a badge, but they don't give you an ID. You can't carry it. I go to foreign countries. If you take it to a foreign country, the ID is back to you, right? But they don't allow you to carry an ID, but they gave you the badge and your current law enforcement. That's strange. Do you have a supervisor that you report to? Yeah. Unless it's a case of emergency. I'm not supposed to give his name now. You're not supposed to what now? Give out his name unless case of emergency. All he's going to do, he's going to Yeah. Hey, I hate to tell you, but it's an emergency. Huh? It's an emergency. How about that one? Uh, let me show you something. Why are you saying that? I don't I don't know if you're aware, but if you present a badge and say you're law enforcement and you're not, that's a that's a felony. I don't I don't use it. Only when I leave this country. I just wanted to show you a little bit of information, right? But you presented it to me and tell me you're law enforcement, but you don't have an ID. That is it. I'm a federal Yeah, federal law enforcement, right? Okay. Yeah. So, like FBI uh I don't want to get in trouble. You don't have any guns in the car or nothing like that, do you? I am. You armed? Oh, yeah. All right, that's fine. Leave it there. All right. Real quick, I'll let you get that phone number, but we're going to just change things up. I need you to shut the car off real quick. Okay. Cuz you're detained right now. Too long. I got to pick it. Okay. Yeah, that's all right. Here, shut your car off for me. All right. Where's your firearm at? It's right there. In the inside of your shirt? In the shoulder holes? Right here. Underneath. Don't reach for it. Don't reach for it. It's right there. Okay. Here's what I want you to do. You're carrying a firearm? Yeah. I'm licensed. Okay, that's fine. I'm going to remove it from you temporarily because of the way things are. All right. What I want you to do is place your hands over that direction. I'm going to take it off of you. Okay. Don't reach for it. Don't reach for it. Don't unbutton. Don't unbutton. For a guy who claims to have a background in law enforcement, this old man shows a remarkable amount of ignorance of standard protocol. If he kept on reaching to take his gun from its holster or to unbutton his shirt, he could end up getting shot. By then, it's pretty clear that his story is about as real as Santa Claus or the tooth fairy. All right. Hi, this is uh Deputy Chandler here. Um, I'm currently investigating a a crime. This is kind of pecular that I get called to you guys. I don't know if this can be accomplished, but this individual is claiming to be a uh federal entity of law enforcement. And the only person that is able to justify whether or not he is or not is your guys' number two in command. So, um, I don't know if I'd be able to speak to Chief uh Morales or not, but if there is a possibility, if he's available, that would be good. If not, I completely understand. What department did you say you're with? I'm with the Charlotte County Sheriff's Office. I'm sorry. Let me uh place you on a brief real quick. Okay. Thanks. I appreciate it. Not a call you get every day. Just the fact that this is a super unusual call says a lot about how unlikely it is that Chief Morales is going to back his story up. The investigating officers clearly embarrassed because he doesn't want to take the chief's time up when he's clearly got better things to do. However, the cop can't risk leaving this guy to keep on pretending to be working for the government. But what are we doing here? What are we doing here? Yeah. Right now, you're detained for a crime. What crime? Impersonating law enforcement until I can figure out otherwise. What I do is I go to different countries and I mediate. Let's say there's going to be an uprising or a coup or something like that. I mediate try to mediate that and bring it down to a lower level. That's what my my job is. Okay. And you said you're actively investigating this place for a crime, right? I'm not. You just said a minute ago you're investigating something. I'm not investigating. I am giving information back. So I'm doing I'm don't do the investigation. That's I should. So right now you're being detained. Do you understand that? I don't understand why. Okay. Because you're impersonating a law enforcement officer. I'm not. Okay. I'm not saying a law enforcement officer. I work for our government. So who do you work for? The Department of Justice. Okay. That's all. You know what? Can can you tell me the different areas of the Department of Justice? Investigations. Okay. What else? That's all I do. Okay. No, like what agency within the Department of Justice? Well, it's mostly foreign stuff like uh I'm scheduled foreign stuff like office of what? Scheduled to go to Paraguay the 25th. I'm scheduled to go to Paraguay 25th of March. That's not how the Department of Justice works. Oh yeah. That's like him being in the army saying, "Well, I work for the Department of Defense." But he works for the Army. So, what agency under the Department of Justice do you work for? Pretty much all of them. Name one. Give me one. Give me two. Uh, just because in case you got lucky. Give me two areas of the Department of Justice. Foreign uh foreign investigations. Okay. Nope. No. We have a different name for that. Why are you guys busting my B? I'm not doing anything wrong except for lying and a felony right now. So until proven otherwise. So and this is we're investigating a felony. I'm just letting you know. So knowing that you're that what you're claiming to be a federal agent, okay, is being investigated for a felony. I would be calling up my supervisor right now. Yes. What's your supervisor's number? And I can call him. I'm not allowed. The whole conversation's going around in circles as the scammer protests that he wasn't pretending to be a police officer as he only claimed to work for the Department of Justice. The officers haven't had any luck getting a hold of Chief Morales. So, they call the FBI instead. To be honest, I don't even know how we ran into this guy. I've been running running ragged all day. Yeah, he's asking those guys down there and they're like, "No, looks uh I think the the term they used was fake." Our contacts with FBI say negative. The term was it's fake as [ __ ] Turn off your car, please. Your car. It's off. I can't hear you. No, it's off. His car is off. Your car is off? Yeah, I already had it. Yeah. Yeah. Step on out real quick. Can you walk? Okay. Or do you normally use your walker? I usually use my walker. Can I get it for you? Yeah. What's going on? You need to stand up and talk about Yeah. This guy seems genuinely surprised the cops blew his cover. Probably because his lies worked on so many other people for so long. He's now learning that it's one thing to trick some junks at a bar, but it's another thing altogether to commit fraud right in front of an active police officer. So, you're getting placed under arrest for impersonating a law enforcement officer. Okay. It's a felony. And I'm also going to charge you with carrying a a firearm and a commission of a felony. Okay. Yeah. We we looked into all that. I've been around long enough work with federal entities that we're not we're not buying it. Just long story short, okay. Not going to be good tomorrow. All right. My our supervisor knows. Everybody our intelligence unit knows. The federal agents already know. We're already talking to federal agents about this. So, they already know. So, it's going to be no surprise. Okay. Like I said, if you give us a a supervisor, we will gladly call. He's looking now. He's trying to find one. Who's that? The police officer. Just call me PD. North PD. He didn't even listen. Yeah. We're done with the secret agent stuff. This isn't all done. Let's make a deal. If this guy was really law enforcement, he would have also known that he'd be facing a mandatory charge for carrying a firearm in the commission of a felony. It doesn't matter whether he used the firearm or not. He was also charged with fraud and impersonating a federal officer. On the 23rd of February, 2024, police officers responded to reports of a male suspect who was attempting a fraudulent SIM swap. The goal here is to gain illegal access to the victim's phone number. That way, he can use password resets and other techniques to gain access to his victim's online banking, social networking sites, and more. When the officers arrive, the suspect fled on foot. Hey, he's running south. He's running south behind the 400 different stop. I'm going to shoot you. Stop. I'm going to tase you. Stop. Stop. I'm going to stop. GET ON THE GROUND. GET ON THE GROUND. DO IT NOW. ON the ground. Get on the ground. Do it now. On the ground, bro. Get on the ground. Your face down. Do not move. Move. Hands in your back. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I ain't got no gun. I ain't got none. Move. Yes, sir. 400. I got none. I ain't got All right. Let me get up. Can we get up? Get up. Now that the suspect's been detained and handcuffed, the real investigation can begin. This kind of fraud can be complicated and difficult to understand, even for law enforcement. Unlike other common scams, it's not something you can easily spot. The officers are only aware of this scam in the first place because of reports they received. You see, you you threw. I wasn't going I wasn't going to risk my life like that. Smart smart choice. Hell yeah. I ain't do nothing wrong. How you doing, sir? You mind just telling me what happened? Yeah. So, um, we have a chat across all the stores, right? And they send a picture of this man trying to use a fake ID to do a SIM change. Usually SIM change, they do it to like get access to another person's bank account information, do all sort of things. Then I saw I saw a person obviously walk in. I thought I was a customer. When I asked for his ID, it was the same Oklahoma ID, but it had a different name on it. So, I was like, "Oh, okay. This guy's wrong." So I called my manager just to like let her know, hey guys rock and then just went to the while she was handling him trying to do the same change. We put like a bunch of barriers like hey I need a bill or whatever was in the back called you guys and then I came back try to just stretch the the interaction as much as possible so you guys can get there. Once he saw the cop card he's like oh give me a second. He grabbed his his stuff and then Okay. And just to confirm the mail that you're talking about that had to that they sent doing fraud to all the other stores with the mail he just confirmed. Okay. He's going to pull the car in so we can finish talking in here so we're not blocking the road. The witness did some impressively quick thinking. Not only did he recognize the scam, but he also found ways to stall the transaction to give the cops some time to arrive. While the suspect had left already by the time the officers reached the store, the stalling still worked because the suspect wasn't able to flee far enough and the cops were still able to catch him. So, let's say my phone number is here and I want to put it in another phone. I just swap the SIM the SIM card and put it into a new phone. And they're doing that as fraud. Yeah. To access people's, you know, onetime pins for bank accounts for for whatever reason. Cuz all the messages will start going to him, right? Exactly. So they when they get the one time pin, it goes to the to the fraudster instead of the actual person. Okay. He also presented anity bill, a fake one of course to you guys or uh to us to us. Okay. I don't think he had that on him. No, he had a picture. Oh, a picture of it. Okay. You have They may have asked this, but you have video surveillance, right? Yes. And when you get back to the store, you'll be able to freeze that interaction. Um me personally, you know, but I can call my If you could, please, that'll be very helpful. We don't necessarily need that today, but our detective bureau will get that video. And as far as prosecution in court, I mean, that's that's I mean, common sense. The witness here is clearly an intelligent young man, and so he's probably never had this much involvement with police before. He clearly knows a lot about cyber crime and the methods criminals use to target their victims in the digital age. Speaking of criminals, the cops still don't know who they actually arrested because, of course, the guy was using a fake ID. What's your name? I can't tell him I'm at the precinct or I mean at the judge you with another charge. Okay, that's fine. You don't want to tell the question? Just if I'm going to jail, you're gonna get hit with another charge. That's the problem. If you want another charge, that's on you. You want to go to jail so I can tell. That's what we're doing. Okay. But if you don't tell us your name, you're going to get another charge. Yes. What's the charge? Obstruction. Cuz you're not you're not letting us conduct our investigation. That's not my job to help y'all. Okay, that's fine. It's fine for me. It's all you. I appreciate y'all for being nice, brother. You know what I'm saying? I just want to go to jail. Take me to jail. Take me to wherever detention center I'm going to. Tell him my name. How's your figure? You might want to give me my name so I can call you by that. Oh, no. You can call me good citizen. All right. Good citizen. You want this phone? Thank you so much, sir. I appreciate it. This quote unquote good citizen was led straight into a jail cell. He was charged with a number of serious offenses, including creating, possessing, or using fraudulent personal identification, unauthorized possession of a forged or stolen driver's license, failure to comply with police or fire department orders, and obtaining property or communications under $300 through fraud. On September 6th, 2022, police in Brook Haven, Atlanta were called out to the Pink Pony Gentleman's Club. According to employees at the club, one of their customers tried to settle his tab by paying with a credit card that didn't have any identifying information on it. Suspicious, they called the cops in to take a closer look. So, uh this gentleman uh it's got a card. There's no chip. Um and there's no name on the card. So, we don't we don't accept it. Run up a $1,200 tab. He's got cash from us. Booze the whole bit. Say, "Hey, I can't accept that." giving him options. Can you Apple Pay? Can you do you know? He's like, "No, not doing that. You took my card last night." So I said, "Show me." So he brings it up. All he's got his ATM transactions. Sure. My ATM will take it. It's not my service. Yeah. It's a service that's provided and there's a machine in there. So just being real hostile towards us. As the manager explained, the customers refusing to pay with any other payment methods and insisted on using the suspicious card. It's important to note because if he just settled up his $1,200 bill via some other method, it's unlikely the Pink Pony staff would have bothered to report him. The cop then invited the customer to join the discussion. So, what happened is the female the bartender said, "Hey, there's no name on the card." and different form of pay. That's all she asked. I said, "Well, last night, literally last night, I literally paid with the same card." Same card. So, what is the difference from tonight and today? That's all that that's all y'all y'all are out here for. Okay. Well, he said that you brought up uh transactions from the ATM, which was not No, no, no. I I can prove that I literally bought drinks here. Okay. Well, so we were here last night. We don't know what happened last night, but but tonight you owe $1,200 and Yeah, I'm cool paying $1,200. But what's the difference from today? And literally, I'm not sure, man. I'm not sure, but that has nothing to do with tonight. Okay. The point here is that the club has every right to ask the man to use a different form of payment, especially if they deem the card to be suspicious. Even if he had used it the night before, they're allowed to change their minds if they just realized it looked suspicious. And if it's true that he used it at the ATM and the card's fake, he could be facing arrest for that, as well as trying to use it to settle his bill. So, either you can try to utilize the ATM and make that and try to withdraw the funds from there. I literally used that card last night. All right. So, outside of this card, do you have any other form of payment? I used that card last night. I can respectfully say, "Hey, I I'll I'll use the ATM." How about you? All right. He's going to max out. They're not going to let $1,200. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's nice. I I literally used that card last night, though. here. His financial institution is going to say there's something wrong which is going to look like willing you 200 time. I used the card last night. Are you going to pay? Are you going to pay or no? I I can pay it. Okay, I can pay it. Outside of this car. How can you pay it? No, it's got to be that card. This guy keeps repeating himself, but his statements don't get any truer just because he's saying them. He sounds like a broken record, but he still needs to pay the company, and he needs to do it with a payment method that they'll accept. The club's manager does what he can to provide other payment options for this guy, but he says no to everything. Well, then I don't know what to tell you. It's not going to be that card. So, you either pay or you go to jail. All right. All right. You got anything you not supposed any pockets? Anything else? Picking anything like that? Nothing. You can't take those with you, right? I will. Look, I need more than pink hair. Well, then why why would you pay him though? I will I It has to be with an appropriate form of payment. Well, my thing is though, I literally used the same card last night. Then the guy starts saying that the card is his business's card, which is entirely irrelevant. Since the conversation was going nowhere and the customer simply refused to settle his bill, the cops were left with no choice but to arrest him. What the customer doesn't know is that he's not only in trouble for not paying, he could also be facing additional charges of fraud if the suspicious card is fake. All right, since I'm going to jail, uh, can I smoke a cigarette real quick or no? [Music] Uh, I got a bad foot. I got you. All right, man. They tried to run it and for some reason it came up as suspected fraud. I don't know what that means. Whose card is that? It's my card. I don't know why it's popping up like that. Like I said, it's a business card, so I mean, if you got to take me to jail, take me to jail. Whatever. Okay. All right, man. Hang tight. Hey, like I said, hey, man, please. Just a quick like two puffs. I can't do that, man. That's against our policy. All right, hang out here. All right. Clearly, this guy cares more about getting his nicotine fix than he does about his potential charges. He was charged with theft of services and taken to Dalb County Jail, and we can only assume that he was also banned from the Pink Pony. There's no word yet on whether the manager of the club was able to receive payment. On April 6th, 2024, police officers were summoned to an IHOP after workers raised concerns about potential fraud. The suspect in the case used a fake $100 bill to pay for his food, and the waitress gave him his change of $71 using genuine currency. It was only after this that she noticed the bill was fake and called the police. You want to walk over here with me real quick? Just talk to these people. Just obviously they they called us for something minor. Um, I just want them to make sure that it wasn't you that they were wanting to talk about. Oh, gave this a just left it like Yeah, I ordered you. Oh, okay. All right. And you paid for it? Yeah. Okay. What happened? So, I I don't know yet. Uh, they said that you you paid with like counterfeit bills or something. So, we'll just talk to him about it and see what's up. What's your name? Sean. What's up? I need to know if this is real because it looks pretty fake to me. That's what I gave you. You gave me this one? Yes. And there's cameras. We have cameras. I'm just Well, this is fake. I have I have straight $100 bills in my car. Can I show you this? One second. Even looking at it through the footage, that bill doesn't look genuine. Still, scammers tend to think that they're a lot smarter than they actually are. And it looks like this guy's tried to use his wits to talk his way out of trouble. But perhaps he'd be better off if he waited to talk when his lawyer's present. Just stay relaxed. Yes, I just need my I got Well, we got another issue going right now. So, we'll talk about it. If you just want your stuff paid for, that's fine. But I just gave him $70 change back. So, he should have the $70 in his pocket. $71 that came back and change. Where's the Is that in which pocket? And you say you got a bunch of other money in your car? Got money in my car. So, this is money that she gave you for I don't I just had I got a bunch of money on me, man. I just have all type of various. But I I got $100 bills. All right. Cuz this one absolutely is fake. And the social you gave me is wrong. No. Hell no. 58306, bro. 589. Yeah, it's showing it's showing there. It's showing not. So, we're going to figure out what's going on. We're going to sit outside. I'll be with you in a minute. If Hey, Kelly, she said she had a plate. Can you get it from her? Excuse me. The guy's also given him a fake social security number as well. So, the cop's probably wondering what else is fake. On a related note, you've got to be pretty dumb to give a cop a fake social when he's investigating you for possession of fake currency. If this guy wasn't suspicious before, he sure as hell is now. But the cops are notoriously good at spotting counterfeits. It looks like passing forge checks possibly. That's interesting. You want to go ahead with your other ones, too, please? He has another one. I think this one might be out of Arizona. It is for failure to appear, public order crimes, and then he has a protection order. Well, when we were in there talking, you got extremely nervous, man. And once I grabbed onto your arm, your your legs were actually shaking like as if like it was freezing cold. Got to understand, I've been to jail before. I hate jail. So I'm like, "Oh no, what the hell? I'm going to jail." Okay. All right. Well, it's not a guarantee you're going to jail or anything like that. Uh just at that point, obviously your social was coming back n um and when you were telling me your name, you were kind of hesitant on it and stuff. Uh so that's why I detained you. When I told you when I told you about the damn board, I mean about this the court case court date I just missed. I was on the phone with him. I'm like, "Oh my god." Yeah, that would have been pretty interesting. Um, anything else in the car that we should know about? No, bro. I just got some clothes and that's it, bro. Okay. So, this guy has a history, too. Given that most of his warrants are for fraud and failing to appear, cops know he has a history of committing these kinds of crimes. This also explains why he gave them a fake name and social security number. Unfortunately for him, there's no way out of this. And the cops are determined to teach him a lesson. Oh, you did have your ID on you. How come when I asked you for your ID, you didn't want to give it to me. Yeah. I said, "Hey, you got an ID?" You're like, "No." And that's why I took your social. All right. Have a seat, baby. You got my back. That's all right. Money matters. Um, so you said just money in the car, your clothes in the car. What else is in that car? Man, it's just my mother my little Okay. So, there's a printer in the car. Too far. Yeah, but it's a old print. Ain't nothing ain't nothing none of that like that, man. Ain't nothing like that. Yeah. Okay. All right, man. Well, I'll see when my supervisor gets up here to see about uh seeing if your girl can come grab her clothes and stuff. And I can you can get the uh $70 for it, too. I put it in the car. The $70? Yeah. So, you you checked out of here. Hold on. Before you tell me everything that really happened here, I'm just going to read you your rights. All right. Having a printer in the car isn't illegal. But if you've been accused of printing money, it's not a good look. The guy claims it's an old printer. But maybe that's why the bill looks so fake in the first place. After reading the suspect his rights, he agrees to answer some questions. So, you don't mind if we uh take a look through that real quick? Make sure that everything you're saying is legit? All right. Uh she's going to sit here with you. All right. Yeah. He's stating there's like $13,400 cash. Um a printer that he said holding from her grandma's house. Not for the money. You really need that. He said it's not for the money. It's a matrix. Um and then his clothes. And then he said he was coming up here for like two weeks, but he didn't want to be sorting through clothes, so he just threw them all in plastic bags and came up here. And golf. $100. What's the uh Forever 21? Yeah. $100 bill. $100 billed. Yeah. Um should I actually start getting evidence bags? Okay. Let me just take the clothes out. There's a receipt here, too. This trunk full of shopping bags and receipts tells the cops everything they need to know. Looks like this guy's been all over town with his fake hundred, using the bills to make low dollar purchases, then pocketing the legitimate money he's given us change. It's a very old scam, but it's still going to land this guy with significant charges. Here's the printer and a bunch of paper. Yeah. Say the the 100 is done. Like you could tell as soon as you touch it, the texture is not there. How money feels almost like that money is one bill. Josh said the rest in the car. He he he volunteered and said, "I have a bunch more hundreds in the car." He said they look legit. I haven't looked at them. So the cops took the printer and other pieces of evidence. They booked the suspect, locking him up on charges of counterfeiting and possessing criminal tools. Given how obviously fake the notes were, he's lucky it took this long before the cops were called. On November 16th, 2023, officers in Florida were called out to a credit union to investigate suspected fraud. For the uninitiated, a credit union's like a bank except it's owned by the members and is run as a nonprofit. According to the report, a woman was trying to cash a check, but the account had been flagged due to suspicious activity. How you doing? My name is Tequila. I don't know what's going on. She just would you go cash [ __ ] for me? I don't got my ID. Yeah, we can we can argue. Oh, no problem. Yeah, that's my ID. That's my license. That's my address. That's That's everything. Can I see her license? Yes, that's my address. That's everything. You got any questions? Any answers? That's what I said. I don't seriously. Okay. Are you going to go in my office over here? Uh, yeah. This my office right here. These checks right here are fraudulent checks. Oh, really? I don't know. I don't know nothing about right here. Honestly, I really don't. I'm a married woman. I don't know. So, what what's going what's going on? Like, my checks. What's I don't know what. See, girl asked me to cash it for her. That was it. It's the oldest defense in the book. This woman who introduced herself as Tequila is trying to claim that a friend asked her to cash the checks and that she had no idea they were fraudulent. She clearly knew there was a chance this would happen and had worked on her argument in advance. That's my address. You want questions and answers? That's that's where I stay at. I have no reason to lie to y'all about anything. Seriously, that should that's the vehicle that you came in. Yeah, that's my car. So, all right. So, these checks here, we've been having these checks passed off in our branch for this week. Our member just came in this morning. These are fraudulent checks here. So, this is like she's like the third person that has come in to cash these check here. Okay. Wow. Coco. Okay. I don't know what you guys need to do. However you want to do I got you. Oh, this is a check. So, you got um notification that it was a fraudulent check. Yeah. Actually, our member came in and reported that her checks were stolen. Wow. When matching up everything, our member just came in this morning. They're fraudulent with checks being passed around. And so many people are bringing those checks and here cashing the checks. How many have you gotten? This is the third one this week. I don't know about that. This is the third one this week. It's no wonder Tequila was caught given that the credit union employees were already on the lookout. It seems someone stole the checkbook and was passing it around. So several different people have already been trying to cash these checks. The only question here is whether Tequila's willing to give the other per up. Yes. She ordered check and never the member did. Yeah. And never received her checks. And then she came in to do an account change when she realized her checks were clear in the account. And when I went we went in and we did our research and we went to verify the signatures. The sign signatures don't match. All of these individuals that are bringing these chefs in have no accounts or anything here and no longer with us. And she's like the third um person that's coming in, but it's different people coming in with the checks. Okay. Who's your friend? Her name is N. Nin. Nini. Yeah. Is that her full name? I don't know. I don't know her full name, but that's a girlfriend inside of the car. I asked her who was the lady that gave her the check. She was just like, I don't know. She's not giving up a name. So, whoever this lady is, this lady has the checks and she's writing the checks and passing them out and having people to cash them for. Clearly, Tequila is not the brains of the operation. At the same time, though, if the mastermind's girlfriend's waiting outside the credit union in a car, she's also not exactly keeping a low profile. It sounds like this whole scheme was dreamed up by a couple of naughty high schoolers who wanted some cash to spend on Fortnite. Walk me through what happened. Okay. Got the check to Okay. So, I was um picking up dropped off somebody at the arcade. Sure. And I seen her seen N walking another guy and it was raining. So, she said, "Can you drop me off at the house?" I said, "Yeah." She said, "Well, I need to cash my check. Catch a check." When I gave you a check, I didn't cash it. Who's this girl? Her name is Nene. That's what I know about Nene. Ma'am, are you with the the girls in this? Yes. I was just crying for her. I don't know what's going on. I don't know. I'm just All I have is her car keys. I don't know. whatever else. I go cash it for you. I didn't I wasn't thinking about nothing like that cuz I don't be around you like that. So, I mean, so she gave you a blank check. She she put my she told me to put my name on it. Okay. She said cuz she didn't have her whoever gave it was already filled out on the check when she said everything else. Everything else. So, your name, the 200, the date, all you did was sign it or I just I just put all I just signed it. That's all I did. decide it. Who's Christina? I don't know who Christine I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. That's a girlfriend right there. That's a girlfriend right there. What's her name? We call her Nene. So everybody's name. Both of them. Both of them are the same. Seriously, both. We call both of them Nene. I do. What? What does Nene mean? Nin mean? That's their name. That's their nickname. So you just go cashing other people's checks? I thought it was she was legit. Well, this is my So, I mean, y'all definitely I don't have no reason to lie. I ain't got time for this. Like, so you're told that you you get randomly handed this check. I mean, I know I know, but I don't know her last name. I mean, I But you get She never did nothing to me like this, but you get told to you get So, you get handed this check. And it just so happens that the pay to the order of is to your name cuz she put it on there. If there was a cut check made out to her, wouldn't the pay of the order already be her name on there? She said the lady told put it to blame. Hey, I to you, baby. So, did she put her name? Say she didn't have a license. Okay. The woman's story makes no sense, and both she and the officers know it. You can tell by the way the suspect's trying to dominate the conversation and talk over the officers, but she knows she's in the wrong. Meanwhile, outside the credit union, the cops have spoken to a couple of other suspects who might have something to do with the crime. There's a black car that's been circling. I guess that's someone who's involved. Her name is Renee. That car that just passed by, the black car is my family. Yep. Right here. This one? Yeah. Am I going to jail? No. I'm trying to figure out We're trying to figure out what's going on. I don't I honestly don't know. I'm I'm honest and I don't like trouble. I would tell you if I knew something. Yeah. I don't know what is Rene's relation. That's that's a that's just the lady that they stay with. Okay. And off of the description that they gave, you determined that that was Renee? Yeah, that's Renee. Okay. Turn off Harvey. Okay. 1050 Moral Harvey on Florida Tech. It seems like more and more people keep getting drawn into this thing and it's getting difficult to remember who's who. So far, we've got tequila. Two different women outside the credit union. And then the driver of the car the officer just stopped. And like the cop said, they're still trying to figure out exactly what's going on. Go ahead. Good. One gave me a check. She was in the front seat of the black car. Yes. And that's Mimi. Minnie. Yes. 107. What you reach in your back for? You just I just saw you put a to check in your bag. Yeah. That's all I did. I saw that check in your bag. Well, how do you know those people back there? I don't. You don't? No. So, you don't know those people? No. So, you want to you want to reframe that? I'm a what? You want to reframe that? You don't know those people back at the bank that you circled a couple times. I didn't circle a couple times. I circled one time. So you you don't know you don't know those people that was out on the ground? No, I was I circled around because I saw y'all there and I didn't want to go in the bank. So you didn't you didn't you didn't circle around. You don't know. I just circled around once. That was it. All right. If Tequila is telling the truth, we can assume that this woman driving the car is na or at least one of the na. And given that the cops saw her sneaking a check into her wallet, it seems like she's the one who handed Tequila the check. All they need to do now is take a look at the check she put in her purse and see if it matches the checks that were stolen from the customer at the credit union. Tell me. Okay. Today I was I dropped somebody off at the arcade. Mhm. And I seen Which arcade? On. Okay. Mhm. So I It was raining. I dropped somebody off there cuz that's what I do. I pick up people and drop them off. So I seen she was walking. Um girl that gave me a check. She was walking. Which one gave the check? Describe it to me. Yeah, she got she got dreads. She have dreads. Got a black thing on her head. That's the girlfriend that's in with that. That's the girl. So, the girl that left on foot, the one that gave you the check. No, that's my friend. Me Mimi. No, that's No, that's my friend Moshi. She's She's at my house because her light her lights is off. So, she's at my house. So, who gave you the check? The girl named Ni. Where's she? She was in that black car when that that stopped. It's hard to tell if Tequila is genuinely trying to help or if she's trying to make things more confusing because her story is difficult to understand. Ultimately, it looks as though her testimony won't be particularly useful. The cops here are just going to have to carry out their investigation and let the evidence speak for itself, which is what they do anyway in any other case. Can you step out the vehicle? Okay. This this how get up here. Have you attempted to cash any other checks? No, sir. Cuz there's been a bunch of them. Not me. You ain't going to be on it? No. That ain't me. All right. What is Nene's real name? That That's That's important. It's very It's very important. It's very important. Um that's the girlfriend out there. I hope that rain ain't coming this way. Oh, it is the chick that's down there. No, that's not that's me or she. That's the one that stays that's at my house. He's staring up cuz her lights is off. She's at my house. Okay. So, what is she up to do with any of this? Nothing. She was we I was leaving my house and her dad was dropping off at my house and she just got a car with me. Finally, it becomes clearer who's who. Tequila's friend Moshi was the one in the black shirt. The one driving the car was Nene who suspected of being the mastermind. And then we have Nene's girlfriend, another Nene, who's the woman with the dreads. However, contrary to what Tequila said earlier, Nene says she's not gay and doesn't have a girlfriend. Do you understand the rights as I explained? Yes. Having these rights in mind, are you willing to answer my questions now? No. No. Okay. Not without a lawyer present. Okay. Well, hold on to her because the check owner might have just showed up here. So, we're going to have to figure some stuff out. The officer's going to Just search you real quick. Hello. Sucks right in the rain too, man. Leave your purse in there or your bag. There you go. 185 220. Good. The one that you have there in that car. She cashed the check earlier today at this location as well. It was yesterday. Yesterday. But at this location, our jurisdiction, correct? standpoint. That's what the bank buys. All right. Hold on to her. 140. Yeah. Where where you at with her? Do you find any checks or anything on her? No, nothing. She just got a ride. She's 1097 Rock. Did a search and there's nothing. All these parts are mine. So, I appreciate your cooperation. Oh, thank you. I appreciate you asking. All right. I'm going to go check out with 220 and see if he needs me to search or anything. Even the cops admit they're kind of confused at this point. It's like a chess game with a bunch of moving pieces. We're trying to do a jigsaw puzzle without having a picture of what it's supposed to look like when it's done. The employees at the credit union are providing them all the help they can, and it helps that they have a cooperative suspect. Once Natty gets their kick page loose, cuz the C is going to kind of take this over because there's kind of a lot going on with this. I got two detectives rolled out up here now and we'll get it all. We'll get it all together and figure it out. I saw her stuffing like a check in the check type book in her bag. Okay. Can I He says we're good enough to search, but hang tight. Let's just wait for what Maddie just pulled up. Tell me how she's not going to talk. What? She's not going to talk about it. She said she don't even know that girl over there. It's full of Yeah. All the detectives are here. I say we minimize our involvement. They want to search the car, they can come and search the car. Okay. So, they're taking us over. It sounds like they are. So, just we'll just stay we'll just stay here right now. The CD is the criminal investigation division and they'll be taking over this crime because it's so complex that it's in need of a more substantial investigation. The CD team will be able to give the case the time and attention it deserves. I think she has a full check cuz she's like she was stuffing something but I didn't want to. I just asked her to step out the car and move her from that spot because Well, let Matty do the interview. Natty was like holding her whole but she was get but woman was getting your head. Thank you. Oh, I s my car this year. Um, it's definitely in black. Okay. You sure? You need to pray on your report. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I saw it. I just didn't want to grab Tabo. You want to stand with her? I'll help her search. You good? No, I'm not. Why are y'all impounding my car? I can get somebody to come get my car. It's part of getting arrested. It wasn't involved in a crime. Okay. Hang tight. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks for coming. You guys are wonderful. We try. We aim. Please. We don't always win, but sometimes it's nice. The good guys got to finish every now and then. The woman we just heard from is the victim of the crime, who understandably does not want to be identified. Ultimately, the woman who tried to cash the checks and the woman who was driving the car were arrested, and they were both charged with organized fraud and uttering a forged instrument. On May 22nd, 2023, police were called out to a Best Buy because a couple had been caught shoplifting $400 worth of tools using a stolen credit card. The store's employees had quickly caught on to the scam they were running and called the officers out to the premises. Fortunately, the cops arrived before the suspects could leave. What was your guys' names again? Stephan. Stephan. And then what was your name? Amy. Amy. Okay. So, before I talk to you guys at all, I'm just going to read you your Miranda rightites. Okay. Do you understand each of these rights? I've explained to you. Then I need an audible. Yes. Yes. And then having the these rights in mind, do you wish to talk to us then? Yes. And then would you like to talk to us now? Having Yeah. You can say yes or no. So they Yeah. Yes. Okay. So what happened? Why am I here? He searched for work in a couple days and we didn't know how how we were going to get his tools for work. That's good, ma'am. I sold all my tools, too. I just lost my job two weeks ago and I sold all my tools and now I Where did you work? Uh, before I put this network. Oh, okay. Okay. I had to sell all my tools cuz my room cuz I'm from Louisiana and stuck out. But I started to work Wednesday. I just, you know, getting more hand tools. Okay. So assuming their stories are true, Stefan sold his tools to pay for his accommodation. But without his tools, he's unable to work. And now that he's got another job coming up, he needs tools. That's no excuse, of course, for committing theft. There are other options, like borrowing or renting the tool, and he probably shouldn't have sold them in the first place if the line of work he's in is going to require them. They don't supply you tools for these jobs? Well, I'm top hand, so I'm supposed to So you're like contracted, right? Um, see, well, there there's two there's two bosses on there's a boss on the ground. There's a boss up top. I'm the boss in the air and then boss on the ground. Oh, you didn't have anyone you could like borrow tools from or something? Well, I'm supposed to have mine so they could cuz I got another guy. I got two more people with me. They're supposed to be able to use mine. And why don't you just tell them like, "Hey, man. I don't have any tools. I know I'm supposed to have them, but times are hard. I lost my apartment." We have a mobile outreach team, too. Sometimes they can help people get stuff. Yeah. So, and then Can we get their number? Yeah, I can give you guys their info. And then, uh, do you are you two married, dating? Like, what's your guys' relationship? You're together. Okay. Obviously, it's a lot of stuff, like $400 worth of stuff. So, you guys are going to be under arrest for theft. The friendly police woman talked to the couple about other options they had, but unfortunately it's a little too late because they've already committed their crime. Stefan tries to cover for Amy by saying he was the one who committed the theft, but she could still be considered as an accomplice. Do you have any weapons or anything in your pockets? Any of you guys got drugs on you guys? No. Marijuana? Anything? You got marijuana on you? I got to have a joint. My kid, please. Yeah, we can. We can call someone when we get to the car. Yeah. Go ahead and set your phone down and stand up for me. Go ahead. Oh, yeah. First offer. Okay. How old's your kid? Nine. Who's watching him? Oh, he's at school right now. Well, there is going to be bail. It's a shame that people like these don't think about their kids before they commit their crimes. The good news here is that it's only 11:00 a.m. and they've got plenty of time to arrange things. So someone can pick their kid up at school. And as the officer mentioned, they'll be offered bail. And if they're able to make bond, which seems likely, they can pick the kid up themselves. Here's what I always tell people that go back to the office, right? When you run and you try to get away and then we catch you, think about how a judge looks at it. But when you go back and you're cooperative like you are with me right now, and you're like, "Yeah, you know, made a mistake. Here's what happened." Then when a jerk sees that, I'm sure they look much more kindly. I don't want to leave my kid. Have you ever been arrested before? Radio. Yeah, I have in Washington. Okay. Who's watching before? That was my last caught to get him back for three years. And I got him back. Oh, gotcha. It's really no surprise that Amy's been arrested before because neither of them look like model citizens. With that said, it's a shame she's still committing crimes after just getting her kid back because arrests like this will jeopardize her chances of maintaining custody. Okay, so now we have several problems. One, there's a 100 million different IDs of different people, a social security card in someone else's name, a bunch of credit cards in other people's names, all in your purse. Yeah, I found them at um at the truck stops that we stopped at, and I was going to mail them back to that address. I don't believe that. I don't believe that you found credit cards and people's IDs and you're gonna find postage and you're gonna mail them back. You just you need literally take them into the post office. Hey, I found this on the road. I didn't know that. And then here's the other thing. Where are all these from? What is all this? Where are all these gift cards from? I got them for um my visit. And then what's that little bag that you white crystal substance you found in your bag? Oh, yes. So, why didn't you tell me that? Because here's the thing. If that would have gone to the jail, you would have gotten another charge. I didn't I didn't have anything in there. If you've ever known a drug user, then you know just how implausible this argument is. Any addict always knows how much drugs they have left. The cop here wasn't lying when she said there were a few different problems here. This case has gone from them trying to steal from one store to them already having stolen from several others. That's why you got to be honest with me and you got to say, "Hey, listen. I do have meth in my bag." Okay, we'll log it. We'll destroy it. So now I'm going to note in my report, "Oh, she said she didn't have it. Now I found meth in her bag." I also found a bunch of different IDs as social security guard cards. Do you think if I look this person up, they'll say, "Oh, my wallet was stolen." I don't know. My phone was stopped. We stopped that in a fairy tale world. Then you're not lying to me that you didn't try to use these people's credit cards. No, I didn't. No, I didn't. You go to a police station, you turn them in. You go to a post office, you turn them in. You don't No reasonable person will keep us. Like I didn't know that. We We just stack of credit cards and ID. We just got back this morning. And where are these from? They're from um like I got those for my birthday. People just sent you these for your birthday. Well, yeah, like a few of them, but I've had those in my purse for a while. Okay. Tell you what, you don't have to be a body language expert to know that Amy's lying to the officer. And while she's pretending to be cooperative, her lies are blowing up her cover. With the information the cops now have, Amy and Stefan could face a whole heap of challenges. Not a very good example for your son. You got to set good examples for him. I know. I'm sorry. You got to think about how these things are going to affect his life. How stealing from a stealing stuff from a store is going to affect his life. health, you know, using meth. I know it's probably hard to get off, but with there's a million different ways they can try to get you off of it and help you. They have resources here. That was my plan was to get cleaning, you know. Yeah. Well, it's time to start establishing that plan and stop saying it and start doing it. All right, Amy. So, we've already got a hold of We'll get that all taken care of. All right. Little less stress you. Okay. All righty. Both of you, just so you're aware, you're both going to be trespassed from Home Depot for one year. And then I think they trespass you from all the locations, but that's with them. But for Lacy PD, if you return to this store within the next year, you will be arrested. Okay. Okay. Thank you guys for cooperating with me. Both of them were taken directly to jail and charged with theft. They were also banned from returning to Best Buy for the next year and warned they'd be arrested for trespassing if they went back. Fortunately, the cops arranged for someone to pick their kid up after school. On the 5th of August 2022, police in Florida were informed about a counterfeit case. Apparently, a man used fake cash to pay for a purchase he'd made on Facebook Marketplace. According to the report, the suspect arranged to meet someone at a nearby mall to buy a pair of Nike Dunks for $160. Do you have the the bills with you right now? The bills? The fake money that he gave you? Yeah. You want all the money? Well, I don't know if the is real. I I think it is real. This is the the issues that the fake 50s. So, do you want to sit down and it's up to you? If you want to sit down, you're good. You don't have to stand there. You sell shoes often or No, this is just a hobby and you want to say his birthday is on the 20th. So, I was trying to get some shoes up to get some money. So, I that is why I'm trying to do this. I started yesterday. So, this guy's selling shoes to raise a little cash for his wife's birthday. After exchanging the shoes with the buyer, he noticed the bills he'd been given had a strange texture to them. But by the time he realized it, the buyer had already fled. Hey, stay right here. He's hiding. He's hiding. Over here, Orlando police. Orlando police. Listen. Don't do it. Don't do it. Get on the ground. Through a security camera, the ball security was able to locate the suspect and inform the officer. While fighting the guy was one thing, tasing the suspect wasn't enough, and the suspect was able to make another run for it. Taser deployed. Give me your head. Stop resisting. Stop resisting. What's your name? What's your name? Let's get him off. Get him on the side. Get on your side. that baby. I'm going to set you up so you could breathe better. For a moment, it looked like the suspect could still escape as he was a better runner than the cop was. Thankfully, a brave civilian happened to see the chase and was able to stop the suspect and pin him to the ground. At this point, he wasn't arrested yet, but merely detained for questioning. That being said, by running, he only made himself look more guilty, and he'd definitely be under arrest pretty soon. Got a car key and a cell phone right here. All right, thank you. Just come over here. speak with him. He was a helpful witness. I'm going to go grab my my phone and my flipflop. When I told you to stop, why didn't you stop? Jaylen. Jaylen, you need medical. You need a medical intention. Do you want them to check you out? If you can't talk now, you're here. Yes or no? All right. You have any weapons on your Yes, sir. You do. You do. I think he's got a zero in his pocket. I can't tell. Is that it right there? Yeah. Okay. That helpful witness was just a member of the public who kicked off his flipflops and chased after the scammer. There's a delightful irony in the fact that this guy showed up to the mall to steal some shoes and ended up getting taken down by someone with bare feet. Don't make any moves. Okay. He's right. I think this is his other one. Come on. Yep. Heading back. Straight. Having a weapon was another red flag because the entire point of meeting in a public place like the mall is to carry out the transaction and make sure everyone's safe. There's no need whatsoever for him to be carrying a weapon, especially since there are families and young children around. There is stolen merchandise from plain view in the car. So, they have peace. They go into the car. Have we confirmed that this is the victim's shoes? Okay. Can I give them back to him? Awesome. That's done. Yep. Okay. Did anybody run any other guns? They ran the one on him. Whoever ran this one. There's a tag underneath that tag. A tag under This just gets the clickens. Wow. The suspect was arrested and charged with uttering forgery, possession of counterfeit bills, carrying a concealed firearm, resisting without violence, and providing false ID to law enforcement. The seller got his shoes back, although there's no word yet on whether he found a legitimate buyer. Scammers are an interesting kind of criminal because they tend to think that they're smarter than everyone else. But whether they're handling fake $50 bills or trying to cash stolen checks, most of them aren't too bright, as this video clearly shows.