Modus Operandi (10 page)

Restaurants are very good marks for these types of con artists. This is a complicated scheme for those of us who don't have natural criminal tendencies, so here's a breakdown of how it works:

1. The con artist enters a restaurant and purchases a small item such as a cup of coffee, so the entire check is less than one dollar. He drinks his coffee, and check in hand, heads for the cashier.

2. He produces a twenty dollar bill for payment to the cashier. As soon as he hands the cashier the money, he begins to talk to the cashier about something that is good enough to interest her: the news of the day, a local event, or something personal such as her hair, lipstick or figure. Remember, con artists are really actors, so he must be debonair—someone a female clerk wouldn't mind taking compliments from.

3. The cashier places the twenty dollar bill in the register while trying to count and pay attention to the customer. She lays the change from the twenty on the counter. The con artist will pick up the small change but not touch the paper money. At the same time he will ask for another item such as a pack of cigarettes.

4. While the cashier reaches for the cigarettes, he removes a one dollar bill from his pocket. As he pays the cashier the exact change for the cigarettes, he holds up the one dollar bill and says to her, "Wow, that's unbelievable, here I had a dollar bill in my pocket all the time and I didn't know it."

5. The con will keep this dollar bill in sight in one hand, while reaching with the same hand for the nineteen dollars change on the counter from his original purchase. But as his hand approaches the money he folds up the one dollar bill with a swift motion and palms it. At the same time, with another single move, he folds up the ten dollar bill in such a way that it is hidden with the remaining nine one dollar bills (or five and four ones).

6. All the time, the con man is asking the cashier another question about something trivial and looking her straight in the eye. He then holds the nineteen dollars in plain sight, with the ten dollar bill secreted within the other nine dollars. The cashier, if she thinks of it at all, thinks that he has placed the single dollar bill he "discovered" in his pocket with the money still in his hand.

7. Since change is always in demand, he asks if she would like to give him a ten dollar bill for the ten ones. He hands her the pile with one hand and takes her ten dollar bill with the other. He promptly pockets the ten dollars and starts for the door.

8. Usually, the con man will pause to light a cigarette, giving the cashier time to discover that she has nineteen dollars instead of ten one dollar bills. He stalls until she tells him of the mistake, or, in the event the cashier overlooks the mistake or decides to pocket the extra nine dollars herself, he returns as though he has suddenly discovered the discrepancy. If the cashier calls him back (and most will), she will show him the nineteen dollars and tell him that he has shortchanged himself. The con man will thank her profusely for her honesty and combine it with the other compliments about her face or figure.

9. But wait, here comes the most important part of the con. The con man will then bring forth the single dollar bill that he had palmed and toss it down with the other nineteen dollars, suggesting once again to the cashier that she may need the change and asking her for a twenty dollar bill in return.

So, for his twenty-one dollars and five minutes, the con artist walks out of the restaurant with thirty-one dollars! Ambitious con artists register as many as twenty or thirty scores a day. Some scores have been known to occur twice in the same place on the same day, because the shortages are very seldom noticed until the count is made at the close of the day's business when the register is counted out.

These swindles are not always done by men; several women have become very efficient working shops where young men handle the cash registers. You guessed it, the womanly sex appeal added to the talk leaves the young cashier boys with nothing but memories.

Another short change scam is the envelope switch, which is very easy. The con artist enters a store and offers a handful of bills and small change for a twenty dollar bill. The cashier, only too happy to get small bills and change, will do it. The con artist takes from her pocket a stamped, addressed envelope and says to the cashier, "This is so I can send the twenty dollar bill to my mother for her birthday." After receiving the twenty dollar bill, and while the clerk is counting the money, she puts the bill in the envelope, seals it and returns the envelope quickly to her pocket. But the con artist is very shrewd, she has short-changed the cashier one dollar, and the cashier, thinking that he is on to her, finds it. The cashier tells the con artist that she is short one dollar. The con artist pretends to be flustered and very embarrassed. She says that she will have to go home or back to the office or out to her car or whatever and get the additional one dollar. She takes back the original bills and change and gives the clerk an envelope, in which the clerk thinks the twenty dollar bill has been deposited, and tells him to keep that in the register until she returns with the one dollar that she owes him. It may be hours before the clerk opens the envelope and discovers that the con artist has left an envelope with a blank piece of paper inside.

The Shell Game

No one knows exactly when the shell game was introduced to the American public but it has probably been played for hundreds of years. It was a popular pastime among the 49ers in California when they were digging for gold. By the turn of the century it had returned to the cities and was causing the police of Chicago so much trouble that they printed descriptions of the game in the newspapers to warn the public. But this only increased the shell men, or nut men as the press called them, and didn't discourage the suckers from the rural parts of America, who never read the big city newspapers anyway.

The way con artists operate the shell game is very simple. Three half shells of a walnut, a rubber pea, two milk crates, and a small table or even a large piece of cardboard complete the con artists's outfit. However, at least one booster (or shill) is essential to the success of the swindle. The shell game is played as follows:

1. The operator of the con game hides the pea under one walnut shell. Then, he moves the shells around the table and bets that no one can tell which shell the pea is under. The booster (or shill), who dresses differently than the con artist, is the first one up to play the game. It is very important that the con artist running the game looks slightly less affluent than the people in the area and that the booster dresses almost exactly like the people in the area.

2. The booster will come up to the game, and the con operator, with ease and carelessness (which only appears to be carelessness), allows the pea to slide slowly underneath one of the shells. This motion is seen by the onlookers. The booster makes a bet and, of course, wins, so the true victim is drawn into the game.

3. The operator appears to handle the shells more carelessly than before. He allows the pea to remain for an instant under the edge of one of the shells. The victim sees this and imagines that he has a sure thing. He makes his bet and picks up the shell only to find it empty. The shell operator, skilled in handling the pea, causes it to pass under the shell picked up by the victim and inside the next shell. This motion is too quick for detection.

Some of the old-time shell game operators were real artists in the truest sense of the word. Not only were their fingers trained to a degree of deftness rarely seen today, but their shtick or spiel was so hypnotic in its effect on suckers that, had they gone on stage with these talents, many of them would have earned far more fame and more fortune than

they did as con artists and sidewalk swindlers.

The key to success in this game is to have crowds, crowds, crowds, because they have money, money, money. On the streets of New York at any given time you can see thousands of these shell game operators working the streets and sidewalks. What makes this game so enticing to tourists and people who do not know about it is the fact that crowds are lured into it. The operator counts on the crowds and their noise.

The booster will scream exuberantly that he has won ten, twenty, fifty or a hundred dollars, thereby attracting a crowd. As we all know, people like to know what's going on to attract a crowd. So, what do we do? We go to the head of the crowd to see what is going on, see the money that is being exchanged, see how easy it is to win (at least for the booster), and offer to give it a shot. The suckers get caught up in the fast pace and large crowds involved in these games.

The police frequently are asked by local merchants to move these con artists along, as they create such crowd problems that regular customers can't enter a store. When the police are seen coming down the block, either with their sweep vans or on foot patrol, the shell game operator simply packs up his milk crates, stuffs his cardboard box into one of the milk crates, drops his lucky pea into his pocket and moves on. Usually, his shop is set up another thirty feet down the block.

Three Card Monte

Three Card Monte may not be as old as the shell game but it is every bit as popular. You encounter it most often today among people waiting for buses, trains and planes. Wherever people have time to kill, a Three Card Monte operator finds enough suckers to make the time profitable for her. This game is similar to the shell game, the only difference being three playing cards instead of walnut shells and a pea.

For instance, if three aces are used —hearts, spades and clubs—they are shuffled around the table in the same manner as the shells and the operator invites the onlookers to pick out the ace of clubs. If she operates with a shill (or booster), she will allow the shill to win a few bets to gain the confidence of the crowd. Sometimes the confederate is given an opportunity to mark the cards so that everybody but the operator knows which one is marked.

After the shill and some of the outsiders win a few bets on the marked card someone is induced to put up a really big bet. But when the sucker turns up the marked card it is not the ace of clubs but the ace of spades. Obviously this is a good example of palming and the game should really be called Four Card Monte. Certainly, four cards are involved though the sucker doesn't know it.

Three Card Monte has many variations, but the best that we have ever seen was worked by a sole operator who used to hang around Penn Station in New York City. He used no marked cards, no shills and he paid off when he lost; after all, he had a two to one advantage so he could plan on winning two-thirds of the time. But to make doubly sure he won, he had a way of shuffling the cards flat on the table that confused anybody who tried to keep his eye on the right card.

Bank Con Artists

Not many years ago, and within the memory of many people, a person who wanted to open a checking account was required to furnish references and one of them was expected to be some type of bank reference. Things are different today. Bankers, pressured by competition and statistics, open checking accounts without any investigation of the applicant or verification of his or her claims to previous banking and business connections. The pressure of competition is obvious; there are almost as many banks as there are drugstores, more banks than bookstores, and their advertising has changed from being institutional to being modern and slick. They spend more money advertising for new accounts than they lose on bad ones. What they don't take into consideration is that their advertising invites swindlers.

There is an old saying among bank management: "Strangers are not always crooks, but crooks are usually

strangers." The most common type of bank swindle by con artists is the split deposit con. Many times a con will open an account under a fictitious name and place a small amount of money in the account, usually fifty to a hundred dollars. After the account is opened, they receive various paperwork and documentation. Frequently, the con will visit the bank making small deposits of ten or fifteen dollars or depositing a check for fifty dollars and asking for twenty dollars cash back. This is to build up the confidence of the people in the bank so that he or she is easily recognized as being a bank customer.

One of Joe's investigations involved a woman, who through a split deposit transaction, deposited a check at her bank for $7,550. She deposited $4,050 to her account and asked for cash back in the amount of $3,500. At another bank she obtained $3,650 cash in a similar transaction. The following Monday, she cashed checks on her accounts for $1,500 at each bank. The total take for one week was $10,150, which is not too bad when you consider that most people do not make that in six months.

The split deposit scam is very easy to do because it plays on the confidence of the teller. When a teller sees that a person is depositing a check for around seven thousand dollars into an account and is only asking for a portion back, they presume the check will be good. But, the con artist knows the check is worthless and that the bank will discover this at the end of the day when they do their tally. The key to this con is the check
must not
be drawn on the bank being swindled.

Many smart con artists know that a bank manager has to initial a check for a large amount before it can be cashed. What they do is scope out the bank to learn the manager's name and, therefore, his initials. They forge the manager's initials on the check and then present the check to the teller at the busiest time of the day. The teller usually will cash the check without question.