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Eighth-grader arrested for using $2 bill

The coming dark age: School officials had an eighth-grader arrested when she tried to pay for her lunch with a legal $2 bill.

“I went to the lunch line, and they said my $2 bill was fake,” Danesiah told the news station. “They gave it to the police. Then they sent me to the police office. A police officer said I could be in big trouble.” School officials called Daneisha’s grandmother, Sharon Kay Joseph, and asked, ” ‘Did you give Danesiah a $2 bill for lunch?’ He told me it was fake,” the grandmother recalled.

An investigation into the $2 bill led Fort Bend ISD police to a local convenience store that gave it to Ms. Joseph, ABC reported. Police were then led to a bank where the 1953-issued bill was examined and determined to be real.

Note that both the school officials and the police had no idea that there is such a thing as a $2 bill.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 
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18 comments

  • wodun

    I suspected the punchline might be the case but it is incredibly disappointing for that suspicion to be confirmed.

  • Wayne

    This is sad. >I read Coin World every week, not a currency-guy, but aware of our paper-money!

    $2 bill (“Note”) was first issued in 1862, technically- a “silver-certificate” (until the early 1960’s.)
    [Currently circulating $2 bills are “Federal Reserve Notes,” “legal tender,” and real. Not widely used but roughly 500 million notes circulate. (We have a $1 Coin that is not widely used as well.)]

    The 1953 dated specimen in this article is maybe worth $5-15 to a collector. (Looks to be in bad shape.) It is a “Silver-Certificate” –possibly 1928 Series, although a design-change was made in 1953 so it could be a 1953 Series. (Design change again in the early 1960’s when they changed it to a “Federal Reserve Note.”)
    –The front of this Certificate said something like “The Treasury will pay on demand $2 in silver coin.”

  • Wayne

    Correction:
    1928 was the last Series. This specimen could be one of 2 different designs, printed/dated in 1953, of the “1928 Series of $2 Silver Certificates.”
    -They all however, remain “Legal Tender” (spendable) but are no longer redeemable in silver coin.

    They called the Police on this kid, which is nuts.

  • Ted

    You know I was disappointed when Cruz lost last night. But this story just takes the cake. School officials, and police did not recognize a $2.00 bill but even more disappointed that they would haul a kid to jail, that a store clerk didn’t know and they had to take it to the bank to confirm it. Like they say in the movies “Ya can’t fix STUPID!”

  • Edward

    You know, a quick, simple internet search (Google or Startpage) would have found the answer in a flash, and the unfortunate girl would not have missed lunch, either.

    Type in “US Treasury $2”, and up comes the choice: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/faqs/Currency/Pages/denominations.aspx

    First three sentences: “What denominations of currency are in circulation today? Will any new denominations be produced? The present denominations of our currency in production are $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50 and $100.”

    Not only do I ask, “what are they teaching children, these days?” but I also ask, “where do our educators get their educations?”

    Aren’t educators supposed to be certified, or something?

  • Robert Pratt

    Glad you saw this. I had much fun discussing the multiple morons involved on Pratt on Texas! Everyone of ‘m was too lazy to do a two second web search.

  • ken anthony

    The world is being run by people too young to remember the $2 bill? They are so confident in their ‘knowledge’ that they act without checking the facts.

    This does not bode well for our future.

    Educators and police should be people we have confidence in.

  • Sandra Warren

    Sad to say, this is not a unique situation. The same thing happened to one of my employee’s children at Deer Valley High School in Antioch, CA about 10 years ago. The son had taken a old $5 Silver Certificate (worth much more than $5!) out of his parent’s drawer, not realizing it was a keepsake, and used it at school in the lunch line. The school accused him of counterfeiting, detained him in the principal’s office, and called the parent to inform her that they were about to call the police. The school actually said that the words “Silver Certificate” was proof that it was not real money. Perhaps they thought it was kook money issued by some militia. Thank God for the internet, by which the wise and all-knowing educators were finally able to be persuaded that it was indeed legal tender. The school was barely able to retreat from their aggressive position, and only offered a half-hearted apology after I wrote a letter for the mother where we explained to them how it was situations like this that put at-risk youth on a collision course with law enforcement. The son, however, did not escape punishment for going into his parents’ drawer and taking their money without asking! He would much rather have faced the police than his father, who had been keeping the bill since the 1950’s. The bill in question was recovered from the lunch line Nazis, and the son had to provide another $5. :)

  • Wayne

    Sandra Warren:
    YOW… that’s terrible & just sad.
    As I mentioned above, all “silver certificate’s,” remain Legal Tender (but no longer convertible into silver) & must be accepted for “all debts public or private.” (They do of course have collector value.)

    Don’t these Schools have millions of dollars of Computers and internet-access?
    Nobody with a cell-phone could look this up? Nobody…
    What’s worse– nobody had a clue about our own MONEY.

    What else don’t people understand? (That’s rhetorical, It’s not that (most) people are inherently “stupid,” buts it’s often the case they believe things that aren’t true &/or have little understanding of what came before the day they were born.)

  • Steve Earle

    As Reagan once said: “The problem with our Liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, it’s that they know so much that isn’t true”

    Unfortunately, the majority of educators now are Progressive Liberals and they hate to be told they are wrong…. about anything…..

  • Wayne

    “Coinage Act 1965”
    Eliminated Silver-Certificates and silver in Dimes & Quarters & reduced Half-Dollars to 40% silver (and eliminated all silver-coinage by 1970)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coinage_Act_of_1965

    Not a currency-guy, but that’s becoming very popular.
    Currency inherently wears-out fast & is constantly being replaced. The silver-certificates in question– huge amounts were redeemed by people before they “suspended payment in specie,” & the Mint just destroyed them as a matter of course. They remain legal-tender for the face-amount & can be converted into “new” money (Fed Reserve Notes), but have a collector value that exceeds their face.
    All our coinage now contains base-metal & all our currency is “Federal Reserve Notes.”

    total tangent: Coins are not considered “legal tender,” paper money however states “This Note is Legal Tender for all debts public & private.”

    You have to pay your taxes with Federal Reserve Notes, and nobody is legally obligated to accept coins in payment for anything. If you try to pay your taxes with a wheelbarrow full of coins, they get extremely upset & do not have to accept them.

  • Wayne

    As for unfamiliar coin denominations—

    “Two-Cent” piece, (copper) minted 1864-1873.

    “Three Cent Silver” piece, called a “Trime,” minted 1851 to 1872. >Way COOL, very tiny! (contains .0217 troy ounces silver each.)

    “Three Cent Nickel” (nickel) piece, minted 1865–1889. (replaced by the 5 cent nickel. )

    “Twenty Cent” piece, (silver) minted 1875–1878. (contains 0.1447 troy ounces silver each.)

    If you find any of these in circulation, don’t call the police, go to a Coin Shop!

  • D K Rögnvald Williams

    Houston school administrators and police should avoid going on that show, “Are you smarter than an eighth grader?”

  • Wayne

    Executive Order #6102– 1933 (FDR)
    Ordered seizure & outlawed private possession of, Gold-Certificates, gold coins, & gold bullion, excepting a small class of gold coins recognized as having Numismatic importance.

    Executive Order #6814 — 1934 (FDR)
    Implemented the Federal seizure of Silver bullion in the United States, excepting silver-coins in circulation.

  • Edward

    Nice research, Wayne.

    BTW: I found a “Wheat Back” penny just last week. It is 1958, but I am keeping it with the rest of my 1958 Wheat Backs. I also have five $2 bills that I am saving. Since the bill of the article is much older and is only worth $5 – $15, I suspect that my collection is not appreciating faster than inflation. *Sigh* The problems of being an ignorant numismatist.

  • Wayne

    Edward:
    Thanks. (I collect Peace Dollar’s & Standing Liberty Quarter’s, took me 20 years to complete the set’s. Not really a Numismatist as such, just love those two coin series)
    (btw: MOST excellent “global warming” posts recently– well presented & thoughtful!)

    I’m not a currency guy, but if you go to the Coin World website, you can find information & pricing. (I tagged that silver-certificate in the article as low-value ‘cuz it looked torn/ripped, better quality specimens— easily $35-50+)

    http://www.Coinworld.com

    For huge amounts of pricing information on American coins:
    http://www.pcgs.com
    ( One of the top 3rd-Party Grading Services.)

    Haven’t found anything good in circulation for maybe 10 years, but used to find Wheat Cents & the occasional silver dime or quarter fairly often.
    –Automated counting machines at Banks (& the Coinstar folks) filter out and keep any silver-coinage they encounter.
    The average $1 Bill, has a life-expectancy of something like 18-24 months. Banks snag worn-out Notes & get replacements from the Fed Reserve. (They shred & burn old currency.)
    Total tangent– Bureau of Engraving & Printing, prints paper-money & stamps, The US Mint, mints coinage.

  • Sandra Warren

    Keep hope alive and keep checking those pennies. When my father died in 2014, I found a bag of about 100 pennies from the 1930s. I don’t think he was keeping them for rarity, particularly. I think they had just been forgotten about in a box. I checked briefly on the values. It didn’t seem like they were worth much more than 10-20 cents apiece, so for fun, I decided to spend them as pennies and put them back into circulation. Sort of paying it forward without ever knowing who is the lucky recipient. So somewhere in the San Francisco East Bay is a whole bunch of those wheat backs floating around.

  • Wayne

    Sandra Warren:
    ab-so-lutely!

    “Change, we can really believe in!”

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