Bogus Sight Drafts/Bills of Exchange Drawn on the Treasury
The Redemption Scheme
There has been a proliferation of bogus sight drafts and bills of exchange drawn on the U. S. Treasury Department. These documents have now appeared in a majority of states and have been used in an attempt to pay for everything from cars to child support. The so-called "redemption" theory being asserted by those who promote this scheme is bizarre at best. Click on the thumbnail image at left to view a full-size image of a "Bogus Sight Draft" (230K JPG file, uploaded 12/12/2002).
A stripped-down version of this theory is as follows: When the United States went off the gold standard in 1933, the federal government somehow went bankrupt. Then with the assistance (somehow) of the Federal Reserve Bank, the government converted the bodies of its citizens into capital value, supposedly by trading the birth certificates of U.S. citizens on the open market. After following a complicated process of filing UCC documents with either the Secretary of State of the person's residence or another state that will accept the filings, each citizen is entitled to redeem his or her "value" by filling out a sight draft drawn on their (non-existent) Treasury Direct account. {Treasury Direct is a system maintained by the Bureau of the Public Debt for holding book-entry Treasury bills, notes and bonds}. The theorists assert that their social security number is also the number of their Treasury Direct account. As a part of the scheme, participants also file false IRS Forms 8300 and Currency Transaction Reports in the name of law enforcement officials and other individuals they seek to harass.
The Reality
Drawing such sight drafts on the U.S. Treasury is fraudulent and a violation of federal law. The theory behind their use is bogus and incomprehensible. The Justice Department is vigorously prosecuting these crimes. Federal criminal convictions have already occurred in several cases: U.S. v. Veral Smith, U.S. v. Clapier, U.S. v. Boone and U.S. v. Moffett. All of these cases were tried in Federal District Court in Idaho. Others trials are now scheduled in other parts of the United States. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has attempted to alert the banking community to this fraud. See Suspicious Transactions, Fictitious Sight Drafts (3K txt file, uploaded 5/16/00)
Bills Of Exchange
With early and vigorous prosecution by the Justice Department on bogus Sight Draft cases, we have begun to see Sight Drafts disappear and Bills of Exchange taking their place. This change occurred on or around January 2001. All of these Bills of Exchange drawn on the Treasury or some Treasury account are worthless. All of the same issues and background materials applicable to Sight Drafts also apply to Bills of Exchange. This is just the same fraud under another name.
For questions relating to the prosecution of these cases, please contact Assistant U. S. Attorney, Wendy Olsen, (208) 334-1211. For inquiries by anyone adversely affected by this fraud, please contact your nearest FBI or Secret Service office.
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