North Korean Counterfeit And Few Seemed To Care

by Bob Hamer

As I recall, the words to Jim Croce’s song from the early seventies went something like this: 

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape
You don’t spit into the wind
You don’t pass counterfeit currency in old Las Vegas
And you don’t mess around with Jim 

Maybe I’m wrong about the third line, but two weeks ago Chen Chiang Liu of San Marino, California learned the hard way from U.S. District Court Judge James Mahan you don’t tug on Superman’s cape and you don’t pass counterfeit currency in Las Vegas. 

Liu was initially snared in the Los Angeles FBI undercover investigation code-named OPERATION SMOKING DRAGON. While out on bail, he was caught passing counterfeit bills in Las Vegas casinos and arrested by the Secret Service. On March 5th, Liu was sentenced to 151 months in federal prison. But this case was much more than merely another federal conviction. Liu was passing the Supernote, a counterfeit $100 bill manufactured by the North Koreans. What made this case even more interesting was the lack of news coverage the trial received. I know because I was the undercover agent. 

Liu was a major player in a criminal conspiracy in which I purchased $2 million of the counterfeit bills. I was told by a co-conspirator with whom I negotiated that I was soon to be the exclusive distributor of the bills in the United States. I would be limited to a mere $40 million annually, purchasing the bills for about 30 cents on the dollar. The trial took place in Las Vegas at the same time OJ Simpson was being prosecuted. Each day I walked from the hotel past the local courthouse to the federal building. Camp OJ was staffed by dozens of reporters from all over the nation following the antics of a former football player charged with stealing back his own memorabilia. Helicopters actually hovered overhead. Yet two blocks away, Liu was on trial in a matter involving an act of war…it is an act of aggression under international law for any country to counterfeit the currency of another nation. 

During my three years undercover targeting members of an Asian criminal syndicate consisting of various loosely connected criminal conspiracies, I was tasked by FBI headquarters to obtain the Supernote. Our subjects brought me various versions of the counterfeit $100 bill, but members of two separate conspiracies brought me the Supernote. How good were these bills? Almost perfect. The bills were printed with the same color-shifting ink as in our genuine bills and printed on cotton-fiber paper using the intaglio printing process. The bills contained the security fibers as well as the watermarks. They were so good that a top analyst at Secret Service initially opined the bills were real. It wasn’t until the bills were examined under a microscope the flaws were detected. In fact, when I saw enlarged photo comparisons of the bills, the imposter looked better than the real thing. 

According to my Secret Service case agent, this was the first time anyone accused of possessing the Supernote went to trial. In the past, those caught entered guilty pleas. Liu, a Taiwanese national, decided to take his chances with the federal judicial system. With a twelve year sentence, he may now be re-thinking his decision to roll the dice in the Las Vegas federal courtroom. In one exhibit we played a video recording of an undercover meeting I had with one of Liu’s co-conspirators, Chao Tung Wu. Wu, believing me to be a criminal confederate, said on camera the money was manufactured in North Korea and distributed through the Russian embassy in Beijing. Expressing fears this might be some kind of “rip,” Wu suggested I travel with him to China and sit outside the embassy as he made the purchase. But even that tape failed to garner national media interest. 

Balbina Hwang of the Heritage Foundation believes the North Koreans produce about $250 million of the Supernotes per year. Various other investigations claim anywhere from $45 million to $1 billion in Supernotes are in circulation. Your guess is as good as mine. Since the flaws are invisible to the naked eye we have no idea what we may be holding in our wallets. 

The world knows North Korea is a nation that relies upon criminal ventures such as counterfeiting, kidnapping, and drug distribution to maintain its solvency. Some believe the North Koreans are producing the Supernote to undermine our economy. One look at our current economic situation seems to show we don’t need outside help… maybe counterfeiting is no big deal.


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Posted Mar 18th 2009 at 12:27 pm in News | 46 Comments