Digital imaging changes face of counterfeit bills
The owners of the Amen Gift Shop never planned on
making a lot of money selling African artwork to help ministers in impoverished
sub-Saharan villages.
But nearly two
years ago, a counterfeiter shattered their trust in the community and their
confidence in running a business when he laundered $3,900 in fake money through
the store's Western Union terminal. Fearful of being victimized again, the
owners closed the little shop. "When you got so much air taken out of the tire,
you don't roll forward — smoothly, at least," says Nwaka Chris Egbulem, a
longtime Catholic missionary and leader of the Amen Foundation, a non-profit
group that ran the shop.
Posted: Thu - August 18, 2005 at 06:30 PM