Money "laundering" in a creek

[chrisild]

On Sunday (11 Oct) some children playing at a creek in Bretzfeld, in the German state of Baden-Württemberg, suddenly found a bag with €2 coins, weight about 2 kg. Their father informed the police about the find, and the police and the local fire brigade searched the area. They discovered quite a few more – a total of 45 kilograms. The value? Hmm, good question, since they turned out to be counterfeits. Now the police are wondering: Can anybody provide any information about why those pieces ended up in the Mühlgraben creek in Bretzfeld-Rappach, or has anybody seen one or more persons who dropped heavy bags there?

Here is the police press release in German. And this image shows the coins, and some dirt. Did not attach it as all you see is, well, a box full of coins. Or rather non-coins ...

Christian

[Figleaf]

Since a 2 euro coin is 8.5 grams, that means 5 300 coins. That is a really small mint run. I think a film crew ordered them in China and wanted to use them as props when they read in WoC they could go to jail for that.

Obviously, having had a few beers to chase away their misery, they stopped to contribute to Mühlgraben and diminish internal tensions, when a young man, identified as Christian F. from D., dressed in black, came running towards them, eyes locked on a Garmin GPS that wouldn't work. The not too sober film men, took him for a policeman and his Garmin for a handgun, panicked, drew up their zippers in haste, one of them making a somewhat bloody mess doing so. The poor victim didn't dare crying out, but his comrades in evil thought they heard him say "wabber" and therefore threw their fake capital in the water, while the person they had taken for a policeman was still struggling with his GPS as he passed them at top speed towards D., not even noticing them...

Peter

[chrisild]

Since a 2 euro coin is 8.5 grams, that means 5 300 coins. That is a really small mint run.

What the police found was not a giant quantity, agreed. But maybe those were pieces that the counterfeiters (or their "distributors") thought were not good enough? Not only mints have quality standards.

Oh, and that runner - for a second I thought that could have been me. Black outfit, Garmin runner, yep. Young man? Well, those people were drunk, it was dark ...

Christian

[eurocoin]

Very strange indeed. These fakes were produced in Europe, not China. Although the photos are bad, I seem to recognize the pieces as a specific type that has also been found in actual circulation. I guess the police caught 1 or more people associated to this coin counterfeiting gang (whether that being for coin counterfeiting or other things) and accomplices got worried and decided to dump the counterfeits they had so that the police wouldn't find evidence if they were caught too. The quality looks quite good so I don't think there was a problem with that.