What is the penalty for defacing currency?

Answer 1

* United States Code * ** TITLE 18 - CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE ** *** PART I - CRIMES *** **** CHAPTER 17 - COINS AND CURRENCY U.S. Code as of: 01/19/04

Section 333. Mutilation of national bank obligationsWhoever mutilates, cuts, defaces, disfigures, or perforates, or

unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank

bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national

banking association, or Federal Reserve bank, or the Federal

Reserve System, with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note,

or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued, shall be fined

under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

Answer 2

In theory, the penalty for defacing U.S. currency is up to 6 months in jail and a fine of whatever the court decides it would like to levy. In practice, such penalties are only used in the most egregious cases; forgery, for example.

Defacing Coins or Banknotes

In theory, anyone who defaces in any way a coin or banknote that is in legal circulation in the U.S. is subject to a 6-month sentence and an unlimited fine. This includes cutting, glueing together, disfiguring and even mutilating the bill or coin to the extent that it cannot be reissued by a bank.

Enforcement

A literal interpretation of that law would be that if you tore a bank note into two pieces, then you could be jailed and fined if they could show that you intended to do it.

Forgers

The law is very widely drawn, but the intent is to try and catch people who are trying to fool or cheat people. Changing a $1 bill into a $10 bill is defacing the currency and would be prosecuted. This is also forgery, but that is a more difficult crime to prove.

What Can I Do?

According to the law, you can't fold, mutilate or spindle money if your treatment means that the coin or note cannot be reissued by a bank.

Prosecution

You can be prosecuted, and it would be possible (not easy, though) to make a case that you putting your name on a bill meant that it could not be reissued.

Source:

U.S. Code Section 333

U.S. Code Section 331

Resource:

United States Secret Service

Answer 3

It is illegal to destroy currency with fraudulent intent. It is also illegal to destroy paper notes with the intent to put them out of circulation. Basically, intent makes the difference between what is legal and illegal in this case; you cannot be convicted of accidentally destroying US currency.

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Answer 4

• United States Code
• ** TITLE 18 - CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE
  • *** PART I - CRIMES
    • **** CHAPTER 17 - COINS AND CURRENCY

U.S. Code as of: 01/19/04

Section 333. Mutilation of national bank obligations

Whoever mutilates, cuts, defaces, disfigures, or perforates, or

unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank

bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national

banking association, or Federal Reserve bank, or the Federal

Reserve System, with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note,

or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued, shall be fined

under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.