Man arrested in funny-money scam

CLINTONVILLE — On Tuesday, May 5, something didn’t seem right at the Walgreens in Clintonville. A 45-year-old man used five 100-dollar bills to load a Chime reloadable debit card. He showed the cashier a photo ID. The cashier marked the bills and put them in the cash drawer. They were the only 100-dollar bills in the till. They could not have come from anyone else.
After the transaction, a co-worker noticed something. Printed on the bill was the phrase, “For Motion Picture Purposes Only.” The shift leader later said she became highly distressed and reported this to the store manager in tears, saying she “knew something felt weird right away.”
According to the criminal complaint, Officer Carter McPheron of the Weyauwega Police Department was dispatched to investigate the fraud. Store employees were able to definitively identify the man as Shaun J. White, from when he was required to present his photo identification during the checkout process and another employee recognized White from him shopping there previously.
McPheron viewed video surveillance footage of the incident and took digital photographs of the transaction receipt.
McPheron called White to about the counterfeit currency. White claimed he had no idea the bill was fake. He told the officer that he would immediately return to the Walgreens store to properly pay with real money.
When McPheron asked where White worked and requested proof of his funds, White stated he could provide receipts and a paystub, and he agreed to meet the officer for a formal interview at the Clintonville Police Department.
White claimed that if he had a counterfeit bill in his possession, it must have come directly from Nicolet Bank, where he claimed he had recently cashed his paycheck. And if it didn’t come from Nicolet Bank, then it must have been switched out by Walgreens staff.
Officer Joe LeBreck of the Clintonville Police Department contacted the bank manager at Nicolet Bank and she said that she had personally conducted a comprehensive review of the bank’s internal video surveillance footage documenting White’s specific transaction.
She explained that all of the physical cash distributed to White during his visit came directly out of the bank’s automated safe, which dispenses money mechanically. This automated system is engineered to detect, flag and isolate fake or fraudulent currency. She stated definitively that all of the money provided to White was real, authenticated U.S. currency.
McPheron reviewed Walgreens security logs and confirmed that no one employed at the store had planted or switched the bill.
At the time, White had three open criminal cases against him in Shawano, Portage and Waupaca Counties.
White was arrested and charged with one count of uttering a forgery, one count of felony bail jumping and one count of misdemeanor bail jumping.