GRASONVILLE, Md. - Counterfeit money is circulating the Mid-Shore.
The Queen Anne's County Sheriff's Department says counterfeit money has been used at several local and chain businesses. The fake bills are all 100 dollars and one clear indication on them is that some say 'play money'.
The Sheriff's Department says the money is being used to purchase small items, up to 10 dollars in total, to get the real money in change. And they say they've recovered about 700 dollars worth of fake money.
Sheriff Gary Hofmann says, "The look is really good on these things. You can imagine being in a dark environment working in a restaurant and being somewhere that's fast-paced and someone is handing you this money. It's easy to mistake but clearly, they're passing these."
Hofmann says this has been a problem since October. They've hit businesses like Starbucks, the Queenstown Outlets, Rams Head, and Winchester Liquors.
Hofmann added, "The businesses are shocked. They're kind of embarrassed that someone took this."
The manager of Winchester Liquors, Sukhvinder Singh, says not only does it hurt financially but... "I wanna say it's more time-killing. We have to go through the POS system then we have to go through the cameras."
The Queen Anne's County Sheriff's Department says it's not just happening in Maryland, but also in Virginia and New Jersey.
The County Sheriff's Department asks that any businesses share their security footage relating to these incidents. They also say they're working with the Secret Service to determine who these suspects could be in Queen Anne's County.
