Secret Service seizes $1 million-bill tracts |
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Wednesday, 07 June 2006 08:00 PM America/New_York |
U.S. Secret Service agents have confiscated more than 8,000 “$1 million-bill” tracts produced by Ray Comfort's Living Waters ministry, saying the handbills too closely mimic real money. Agents showed up at the Denton, Texas, office of Great News Network (GNN) last Friday and took the entire stock of the tracts, used by Comfort and co-host Kirk Cameron on their TV show, The Way of the Master. WorldNetDaily.com reported that the action followed an attempt by a woman in North Carolina to deposit one of the million-dollar bills into her bank account. GNN founder Darrel Rundus issued a statement at the organization's Web site, saying that “according to the U.S. Treasury,” it is illegal to duplicate and make copies that are comparable to existing currency with the intent to commit fraud. “Since there is no such thing as a $1 million-dollar bill in circulation, it is obviously not illegal to create, print and/or distribute one. … How do you counterfeit something that doesn't exist?” Rundus said “he felt that the (Secret Service) was “overzealous in their seizure of our property, and they violated our constitutional rights by depriving us of property without due process.” One side of the tract, which is the same size as a $20 bill, has fake seals and a portrait of Grover Cleveland. The reverse of the bill has a printed gospel message.
Federal law says bill facsimiles for novelty or advertising purposes must be at least 50% larger or 25% smaller than actual size and cannot contain anything resembling government seals, The Washington Post |