A Home Depot worker exchanged real money for toy bills for four years, until he was discovered.
Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
United States Secret Service agents arrested Home Depot employee Adrian Jean Pineda. for passing $387,500 in counterfeit US currency.
The worker tried to be smart exchanging real money for toy bills and was discovered and arrested by the authorities.
Secret Service agents from the Phoenix Field Office arrested Pineda at the Home Depot in Tempe. Pineda was a Home Depot vault associate responsible for preparing cash from registers for bank deposits, a process that included count cash and seal cash bags for transfer and deposit at Wells Fargo Bank.
According to information from the United States Secret Service, Pineda is accused of taking genuine currency from Home Depot warehouses and replace it with fake currency during your turn.
From January 2018 to January 2022, Home Depot recorded $387,500 in losses due to receiving counterfeit bills in its cash deposits.
The New York Times noted that It was play money, bills that are used in the movies or in plays and that they even have the legend of “Playmoney” as a serial number and a text that clarifies that they are “Only for the use of movie accessories”. The employee was also said to be buying them from Amazon.
During Pineda’s arrest on January 31, 2022, Secret Service agents seized $5,000 in counterfeit currency and recovered $5,300 in genuine currency. An additional $22,000 in legitimate currency was also recovered during the execution of a search warrant at Pineda’s home.
The accused employee will appear in federal court in Phoenix for violation of 18 USC 472, regarding the use of counterfeit US currency.
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Source-eldiariony.com