Santa Ana : Printer Admits Guilt in Counterfeiting Case

A Costa Mesa printer pleaded guilty Tuesday to charges of forging almost $10 million in cash in what authorities say was one of the biggest counterfeiting schemes in U.S. history.

Tracing a trail of phony cash spotted in Orange, Los Angeles and Riverside counties, federal prosecutors charged after his arrest in April that Hal J. Stepanich, 33, produced the fake cash in a garage near Palm Springs, using about $10,000 in printing equipment.

Authorities described the product--in denominations of $20, $50, and $100--as passable to the untrained eye, but could be spotted under expert inspection because of discrepancies on the back of the bills. They believe that the bulk of the phony currency was recovered from a Costa Mesa hiding place before entering circulation.

Stepanich, who worked as a pressman at a Costa Mesa print shop until February, was to have gone on trial beginning Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana. Instead, he changed his plea to guilty after reaching an agreement last week with federal prosecutors.

Prosecutors agreed to recognize Stepanich’s cooperation in leading authorities to the hidden cash after his April arrest and providing other information. That acknowledgement by prosecutors may help him at his Sept. 26 sentencing, his attorney said. Stepanich could face more than three years in prison on the counterfeiting conviction under federal sentencing guidelines.

Another former Orange County man who allegedly conspired in the plot, Richard L. Wattel, 62, pleaded guilty earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Houston to two counterfeit-related charges, court officials there said Tuesday. A longtime friend of the Stepanich family, Wattel is to be sentenced Sept. 11.