Frank Bourassa We've all seen a movie
or TV show where some sleazy guy in a suit prints fake U.S dollars on a giant printer
inside a decrepit warehouse. For Frank Bourassa, this trope was a reality—and
one he was really good at. Unlike the fictional depictions, printing and distributing is
very difficult to pull off, making Bourassa's criminal achievements more impressive.
He created a fake 20 dollar bill that no one could detect with the naked eye. In fact, only trained
professionals can tell the difference between a U.S Mint printed 20 dollar bill and Bourassa 20.
Bourassa printed thousands and thousands of Andrew Jacksons during his stint
as a money counterfeiter. In total, he printed over $250 million worth of 20s.
Some of those bills stayed in circulation long after the authorities shut his
"printing" factory down. The secret service continued finding his forged bills in California,
Nevada, and small pockets of the Northeastern United States.
According to Celebrity Net Worth, $250 million is a lot of fake money
in the counterfeit business. It's actually the all-time record for most counterfeited money
in U.S history. And he's not even from the United States.
Bourassa grew up in Quebec, Canada, where he showed an aptitude for entrepreneurship at a
very young age. Though, his business strategies usually involved making money outside of the law.
Shoplifting Ring Bourassa started his first business when he was
in junior high. How? He realized how easy it was to shoplift. He stole from all kinds of stores,
took the items home, organized them, then sold them to distributors he knew from school.
Before young Bourassa knew it, he built a flourishing shoplifting ring.
When Bourassa turned 15, he quit the shoplifting ring
and dropped out of high school. He moved out of his parent's house to work at a mechanic shop.
However, the job didn't pay well, and Bourassa often resorted to car theft to pay his bills.
Eventually, Bourassa got tired of working for someone else. So,
he founded a shoe factory in his early 20s. It was his first legal business.
The Shoe Factory Running the actual business proved
very difficult, a factor Bourassa overlooked when he decided to start an
honest business. Bourassa decided the best thing to do was sell the factory, which he did.
According to media interviews, Bourassa says running the factory burned him out.
He claims he worked 20 hours a day. "And for what?" he kept asking himself. Bourassa
thought about it philosophically and came to a simplistic conclusion:
just like everyone else; he worked for money.
Money was always the end goal. Bourassa says he reached this conclusion while waiting at a
red light. He came up with the idea to make money instead of working for it. However,
as mentioned earlier, literally making money isn’t as easy as it sounds.
So, for the time being, Bourassa returned to a different kind of crime: growing cannabis.
Bourassa literally grew his new business to extreme heights, higher than his previous
businesses. And it probably would have grown even more had he not got caught by the Mounties.
The former cannabis grower spent four months in jail. Bourassa decided
enough was enough when he got out. It was time to try counterfeiting money.
Research The first thing Bourassa did was research. Lots of
research. He wanted to do this right. He already learned how to grow his cannabis without any
previous experience in the industry. He knew what it took to create a complex business from scratch.
His primary source, ironically, was the United States Secret Service website. There,
he learned that he had to counterfeit U.S dollars exclusively because of the
type of paper they used. The U.S mint still uses a combination of linen and cotton to
manufacture their paper dollars, which is, apparently, an archaic way of making money.
Bourassa says the paper is easier to counterfeit. For example, other countries, even third world
African nations, have moved on to better types of paper made of polymer. Still, the U.S adheres to
the linen and cotton material of old. The new paper most countries use is almost impossible
to reproduce, making it impractical to print when the United State's dollar is much easier.
The secret service also mentioned what kind of printers they use to make U.S dollars.
Remember, it was the early 2000s; things were different.
By then, Bourassa had every bit of information he needed. He knew what kind of printer he needed
and where to get it. He also learned what companies made the linen and cotton paper
used to make U.S dollars through his research. All he had to do now was put his plan into action.
Printer Wanted The first thing Bourassa needed
was a printer. The only problem? Money printers are expensive. Many sold in the six figure range,
which is a lot of money for an ex-con with no real job. The rest of the necessary equipment,
such as materials, or ingredients, as Bourassa calls them, were just as costly.
Somehow, Bourassa got the money together. He bought the printer for 125,000,
and the paper materials cost 50,000. After adding up all the other expenses,
the venture cost Bourassa 325,000 Canadian dollars.
The trickiest part, Bourassa says, was getting the paper made. He bought the
ingredients, but he needed a paper mill to manufacture the paper for him. If not,
there was no way he could do that himself.
The paper had to be made in a specific way: 75% cotton and 25% linen. He also
needed them to put watermarked images of Andrew Jackson on the front of the paper.
The image was a distinct mark of a legit 20 dollar bill. Bourassa says checkers hold the
bill up to the light for verification. Without the watermark, anyone could spot them as fake.
Fortunately, Bourassa discovered the only paper mills that made paper like this
were in Europe. The tricky part would be getting them to manufacture American paper bills
with real watermarks. For that, Bourassa needed a good plan. Enter Thomas Moore.
Thomas Moore Bourassa contacted the
European paper mills, specifically in Switzerland, as someone else:
a fictional man named Thomas Moore. "Moore" asked the mills to make his paper into bills,
the same size as a U.S dollar, along with the same ingredients as a dollar.
At first, the mills were suspicious. Bourassa assured them that he was legit,
however. He told them he was an investment manager from the United States. His company wanted to
manufacture their own bonds. Bourassa told them that the bonds had to be made from secure paper.
The mills believed Bourassa's story. Bourassa was surprised they weren't suspicious,
especially since he was printing Andrew Jackson's image onto his bills. Eventually, Bourassa says he
realized that most people in Switzerland didn't know who Andrew Jackson was, much less what he
looked like. In other words, they didn't think twice about printing the watermark.
Everything was going according to plan.
Connections Bourassa instigated
his plan in 2004 and didn't complete the printing operation until 2008. He and his
crew printed 20s as quickly as possible until they'd built a massive inventory of fake cash.
Now, he just needed some clients. Bourassa maintained a few relationships with contacts
in the criminal underground. He was specifically looking for organizations that needed clean money.
Some of these organizations were looking to pump their money into continents like Africa,
Asia, and Europe. Ideally, Bourassa wanted his bills
to circulate in these areas first before entering the United States.
If the money moved around in these foreign nations before hitting the U.S.,
it'd be hard for federal agents to trace them back to Bourassa. The newly-established counterfeiter
tasked one of his associates with finding organizations that fit Bourassa's criteria.
The associate had ties to the criminal underworld,
so it wasn't long before Bourassa had a few clients lined up.
The Wrong Customer Bourassa had the counterfeit business
down to a system. First, an order came in. If an organization needed $100,000 in 20s, Bourassa
charged them $30,000. On a much smaller scale, his rate was 6 real dollars for every 20 fake dollars.
Most customers ordered six-figure sums like $100,000 or $200,000. Business was
good. Bourassa made all his money back in less than three orders. He says,
at the time, there was no doubt in his mind that he would be a multi-millionaire.
The dream was right there before him, and he didn't want to lose it. To protect his dream,
Bourassa became more paranoid with each subsequent order. The operation ran out
of a big garage owned by the uncle of one of his associates. Bourassa says he spent
many hours looking through binoculars from the window while his team counted and packaged 20s.
Waiting on the paper shipments from Switzerland was torture, he says.
They often took weeks to arrive. And weeks were more than enough time for
a team of cops to set up a sting at the harbor.
Nevertheless, Bourassa pushed past his paranoia and kept the business going.
Eventually, he reached his 5th client, who ordered $100,000 worth of 20s—a pretty normal order.
Then, the next day, that same client ordered another 100k,
which seemed odd. Nevertheless, Bourassa delivered the order,
not knowing that his 5th client was an undercover agent posing as a gangster.
60 Years On May 23rd, 2012, at 5 in the morning,
Bourassa woke up to someone yelling at his front door. Then, the person slammed on the door,
screaming for him to come quietly. Bourassa opened the door and saw a squad of Royal
Canadian Mounted Police Representatives and two U.S. Secret Agents standing on his doorstep.
The Mounties took Bourassa into custody and charged him with several counts of fraud. They
explained to Bourassa that he was probably facing around 60 years in prison for what he'd done.
The police had already located $949,000 in Bourassa's counterfeit 20s.
They had all the evidence they needed, but they didn't have all the fake 20s,
anywhere near all $250 million worth. In fact, they didn't know it existed.
Counterfeit Deal In a crazy turn of events,
the Canadian government realized they couldn't use some of the evidence they obtained from Bourassa's
business. The evidence itself was inconclusive, and they released him on a $10,000 bond.
Meanwhile, the secret service watched Bourassa like a hawk,
waiting for him to mess up. Bourassa was walking on a tightrope. The secret service would
inevitably catch him doing something illegal and extradite him to America.
The secret service and the Canadian government didn't want Bourassa
circulating fake money anymore after he told them how much he had stashed away.
So, the Canadian government brokered a deal with Bourassa:
we'll only charge you with drug possession, fine you $1,500,
and imprison you for 45 days if you hand over the rest of your counterfeit money.
Bourassa accepted the deal and spent less time in jail
for counterfeiting than he did growing cannabis.
Aftermath When Bourassa was released from prison,
he started his own security company, similar to another Frank, who's famous for mass forgery.
Bourassa also founded a self-help brand called the Paradigm Shift System.
He has become a guru of sorts. Now, he might follow in the footsteps of Frank Abagnale
and have a biopic produced based on his life.
If Bourassa's life is immortalized on screen,
he could become America's next legendary criminal folk hero. But only time will tell.
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And let us know in the comment section what you’d rather have,
10 million in cash of the best counterfeit bills, or half a million of real money!