Police-Made Fake Bills in Circulation
By Park Si-soo
Staff Reporter
Police are looking to prevent 70 million won ($48,000) of fake banknotes, now presumably in the hands of a kidnapping suspect, from being circulated in the market.
But it was confirmed Wednesday that part of the money had already been used by the suspect ― Chung Seung-hee ― to purchase a used motorcycle in Seoul Tuesday. With additional use of the notes unreported, police are expanding their efforts to catch the 32-year-old as early as possible.
Chung has been placed on the wanted list on charges of kidnapping a female bakery owner Feb. 10. To help the investigation, police revealed Chung's identification and photo to the public, offering a five million won reward for key information.
According to staff at Gangnam Police Station, they were tipped off Tuesday evening that Chung paid seven million won in cash to a 31-year-old man identified as Park to buy his 250cc ivory-colored motorcycle.
Park said during questioning that he had received a phone call from the suspect soon after he posted an ad online to sell his bike, an officer said.
``Discovering all the notes he received had the same serial number, he immediately called the police,'' the officer said. But Chung disappeared before police arrived.
Police are analyzing CCTVs installed around the routes through which Chung may move.
The National Police Agency made 120,000 bogus 10,000 won bills in September 2007 for use as ransom in kidnapping cases. To distinguish them from genuine ones, it printed the same ID numbers (EC1195348A) with a gray line where silver holograms are supposed to be. They are also 1 millimeter longer on all four sides than authentic bills, police said.
In this case, the fake cash was used to get the release of the bakery owner. They were delivered in briefcases with tracking chips secretly attached but these failed as the suspect disposed of the bags when releasing the woman.