"Entertainment Executive Living in Cheongdam-dong" 30s Man Caught After Meeting Women with 6 Billion Won in Fake Checks

Tracked down after breakup with ex-girlfriend
Arrested by police after more than six months of investigation

A man in his 30s who manufactured about 6 billion won worth of counterfeit checks to show off his wealth to women has been arrested.

According to Yonhap News on the 24th, the Gunpo Police Station in Gyeonggi Province announced that it had arrested suspect A (33) and referred him to the prosecution on charges of violating the Act on Regulation of the Issuance and Use of Checks, etc. The police also booked without detention A's former girlfriend, suspect B (29), and referred her to the prosecution on suspicion of using the counterfeit checks (uttering forged negotiable instruments).

A is accused of deceiving a print shop operator in August 2021 by saying, "I need to make props for a YouTube shoot," and having more than 6,000 checks in the denomination of 1 million won printed, thereby producing and possessing counterfeit checks totaling 6 billion won.

Counterfeit bills hidden in suspect A's car trunk. Gunpo Police Station, Gyeonggi Province

At the time of the crime, he selected paper at the print shop that had a texture similar to ordinary checks and printed the counterfeit checks in the same size and thickness. Using Photoshop, he erased the serial numbers printed on existing checks and entered 57 new serial numbers that were randomly generated, producing the counterfeit checks in this manner. The print shop, for its part, had engraved the word "sample" on the back of the checks to indicate that they were fake, but A stamped his personal seal over it to disguise them as real checks.

Afterward, A concealed the fact that he was an office worker and posed as an employee of an entertainment company, meeting several women. He carried a large number of the counterfeit checks he had made in his wallet and falsely claimed to be a wealthy graduate of a prestigious university in Seoul living in Cheongdam-dong.

A's crimes were exposed after he broke up with a woman he had dated for several years. While separating after having lived together with A, his former girlfriend B secretly took four bundles of counterfeit checks (worth about 400 million won) from the home, and attempted to cash some of them. In July last year, B presented five counterfeit checks at a bank in Gunpo City and requested that they be deposited into an account. A bank employee checked the serial numbers, confirmed that the checks were counterfeit, and reported it to the police.

When the police arrived, B falsely stated, "I received this money back from my ex-boyfriend, which I had lent to him. I did not know the checks were counterfeit," and tried to obstruct the investigation by changing her mobile phone and coordinating her story with A. A is also said to have hindered the investigation by refusing to appear before the police and instructing B to give false testimony.

After more than six months of investigation, the police urgently arrested B on the 6th of this month. They subsequently executed an arrest warrant for A as well.