Task force combats crimes of economics

Kim Smith

Tuesday, Sept. 14, 1999 | 11:20 a.m.

Federal and state agencies are combining their efforts to go after criminals who are hitting Las Vegas residents in the pocketbook.

The existence of the Economic Crimes Task Force was announced Monday by U.S. Attorney Kathryn Landreth.

Although the task force was formed in the spring, its announcement was withheld until the group completed its first major case last week, said Joseph Saitta, U.S. Secret Service special agent in charge.

On Sept. 8 the last of 22 people suspected of passing $500,000 in counterfeit checks were indicted by a federal grand jury.

According to a news release, task force members began their investigation in April 1999 after finding counterfeit business checks, counterfeit business identification, fake Nevada identification cards and computer equipment during a search of a Las Vegas home.

"We got the task force started because of all of the economic crimes we've got going on," Saitta said. "We didn't want to duplicate our efforts."

In addition to pursuing counterfeiters, Saitta said the task force will be focusing on such crimes as bank fraud, credit card fraud and mail theft.

Making up the new task force are representatives of the U.S. Attorney's Office, U.S. Secret Service, FBI, Henderson Police Department, Metro Police Department, U.S. Postal Service, North Las Vegas Police Department and Clark County District Attorney's Office.

Passing fake corporate checks is a popular misdeed nowadays thanks to "user-friendly" computers, printers and scanners, Saitta said.

"If you look at it the way criminals do, instead of counterfeiting a $100 bill, you can use the same equipment and counterfeit a corporate check for $500," Saitta said. "You can make more money, faster."

Computers have made it easier for criminals to work in other respects as well.

"Years ago, in order to make counterfeit checks or money you had to be a printer and you had to print large quantities at once," Saitta said.

Now criminals can just save their work on their computer and print out the fake checks when they need them, Saitta said.

"People who counterfeit checks are bound to counterfeit other things, too, like birth certificates," Saitta said.

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Howard Zlotnick said that because crime rings often have members working throughout Southern Nevada, it just made sense to get the different jurisdictions to combine their resources.

By pursuing the cases federally, state courts become less burdened and the defendants get harsher sentences, Zlotnick said.