$30 Million in Bogus Bills Is Seized; 3 O.C. Men Held : Counterfeiting: The unrelated busts had a common thread, agents say, which was to finance the purchase of illegal drugs.

Three Orange County men were arrested and a total of $30 million in fake money was seized in two counterfeit operations that were intended to finance drug trafficking, federal agents announced in Los Angeles on Thursday.

In Huntington Beach, two men were arrested at their rented townhouse on Racquet Lane on May 21. The U.S. Secret Service seized $20 million in counterfeit money in that case, one of the largest seizures in the history of the agency, officials said.

In the second, unrelated case, a La Habra accountant was arrested May 31 and charged with operating a counterfeit scheme from a rented warehouse in Pomona. A total of $10 million in counterfeit money was seized in the Pomona arrest, agents said.

The two cases, while not directly related, had a common theme, according to Clint Howard, head of the Secret Service in the Los Angeles area. At a Los Angeles press conference, Howard said that all three suspects planned to use the bogus money to purchase drugs in Central and South America, and then to sell the drugs in the United States.

“We feel these cases are a sign of the times. Narcotics and narcotic-related offenses are having an impact on all crime areas, from the burglar who steals to feed his habit to the counterfeiters who are using their product to rip off dope dealers,” Howard said at a Los Angeles press conference,

The arrests foiled the counterfeiters’ plans to launch their drug-buying scheme, agents said, adding that there is no evidence that bills from either operation went into general circulation.

In Huntington Beach, federal agents arrested Terrence Nikrasch, 55, and Joseph Kelly, 54, both of whom lived in the rented townhouse in the 18000 block of Racquet Lane. Kelly had previously been arrested on counterfeit charges in Los Angeles in 1981 and 1985, agents said. Nikrasch had previous convictions in Orange County on charges of grand theft and receiving stolen goods, according to Orange County Superior Court records.

The Huntington Beach arrests were not announced until after the Pomona case was cracked in order not to jeopardize the latter investigation, agents said.

The rented house on Racquet Lane is in Huntington Beach’s Five Points area, near Main Street and Beach Boulevard. The residence is about 2 1/2 miles from the beach. Townhouses in the complex sell for $250,000 or more.

The two suspects had rented the townhouse for “just a few months,” according to the rental agent for the property, who declined to give her name.

Neighbors in the area, who also declined to give their names, said Thursday they had noticed nothing unusual at the three-story, gray-and-white townhouse rented by the two men. The first story of the townhouse is a two-car garage, and, according to one neighbor, that is where printing equipment was seized by federal investigators.

“I saw what happened the day the arrest was made,” said one man, who lives on Racquet Lane. “I noticed cars coming down this street at a pretty good speed. There were about three of them--unmarked cars. The guys that got out stormed into that house, and they brought out one man--one man is all I saw--in bracelets (handcuffs).

“Later, I walked by there, when they got the garage open, and I saw work tables, printing presses, and they even had a darkroom set up in there.”

The rental agent for the townhouse said Thursday that she was indignant about the condition of the place after the two men had been arrested.

“They (the two men) must have had printer’s ink on their hands because they left marks on the walls,” she said. “We had to paint the place again. I’d love to get my hands on those men. We had no idea something like this was going on.”

Orange County Superior Court records show that Nikrasch was convicted in 1981 of grand theft and receiving stolen property. That conviction stemmed from a theft at a Dana Point jewelry store in 1979. Nikrasch was sentenced to two years in prison on the charges. Nikrasch also was convicted in 1971 for receiving stolen property in Garden Grove, court records show. The records additionally disclose that Nikrasch was convicted of burglary in San Luis Obispo in 1969 and larceny in 1956 in Brown County, Wisconsin.

Nikrasch, at the time of his arrest last month, was on parole for a racketeering conviction in Las Vegas, Howard said, adding that Kelly was on parole for a previous counterfeiting conviction.

Howard said Kelly and Nikrasch met in a federal prison in Arizona.

In the Pomona operation, agents arrested Gary K. McMurtry, 46, a La Habra accountant. Agents said he was essentially operating alone in the alleged counterfeit scheme, which used a rented warehouse in Pomona to crank out fake $100 bills.

Howard said the counterfeit cash in the Huntington Beach operation was of “average” quality. Howard said the printing presses seized from Racquet Lane had the potential to produce $100 million.

The quality of the bills found in Pomona, Howard said, was “very good.” The equipment there had the potential to produce more than $1 billion in bogus bills.

According to a federal criminal complaint, all three defendants were charged with manufacturing counterfeit currency. They are being held without bond in the Metropolitan Detention Center.

Times staff writer Matt Lait contributed to this story.