Everything’s Bigger in Texas — Including Bad Checks

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Saying he was planning to start a record company, Charles Fuller tried to cash a large check at a bank in Fort Worth last week.  Problems with this story included:

  1. One does not normally start record companies using cash; and
  2. The amount of cash he asked for would have been difficult to carry; because
  3. He was trying to cash a check for 360 billion dollars.

$100 bill
According to the U.S. Bureau of Printing and Engraving, the agency that produced all the currency Mr. Fuller didn’t get, every note weighs about one gram.  There are 454 grams to a pound, so assuming the bank had been able to cash the check and that Fuller had asked for $100 bills, he would have been instantly crushed under nearly 8 million pounds of money.

Luckily for him, this didn’t happen.  Sharp-eyed bank employees, possibly noticing the ten zeros on the personal check Fuller presented, contacted the account’s owner just to see if there was anything wrong.  "Hi, this is the bank calling.  Say, did you by chance write anyone a check for a third of a trillion dollars recently?  No?  Okay, thank you for your time.  No, no problem with your account.  Just asking."

Fuller, who in a quest for extra bonus points had taken the check from his girlfriend’s mother, was arrested for forgery.

Link: CBS News