Bank Teller Arrested for Alleged Role in Counterfeiting Ring

A Canoga Park bank teller has been arrested in a multimillion-dollar check counterfeiting scheme that focused on companies with large payrolls, authorities said.

Paulina Tran, 23, was arrested Thursday at the Bank of America branch where she had worked for six months, said Long Beach Police Cpl. Wes Workman. She is suspected of providing payroll checks to counterfeiters for about two months, police said.

Police have arrested about a dozen people in connection with the scheme.

Tran provided counterfeiters with teller-stamped payroll checks, which she delivered or faxed to her associates, police said.

Then, using high-tech color scanners, computers, embossers, laminators and bank-grade paper, counterfeiters copied and reproduced the payroll checks, police said. Counterfeiters also forged credit cards, cashiers checks and identification cards and were involved in illegal weapons sales, investigators said.

Most of the checks, valued at between $900 and $1,000, were cashed by couriers--who received 10% of the profits--at banks from San Diego to San Francisco, investigators said.

The case was cracked by an undercover Long Beach police officer who infiltrated a ring of mostly young men after counterfeit checks began turning up in Long Beach nearly a year ago, said Long Beach Police Sgt. Chris Marino.

Investigators have been unable to trace the money and speculated that the ring might be working for criminal enterprises with roots in Hong Kong, Marino added.