WOODBURY — In a one-day trial in Superior Court, a U.S. Secret Service agent testified he determined $410 in $20 and $50 bills seized in the arrest of Ryan T. Martin and an associate were counterfeit.
Martin, 30, of Pitman was found guilty Tuesday of passing counterfeit bills and altering currency.
The bills lacked security factors and several bills had the same serial numbers, indicating they had been copied from the same genuine bill and altered to show a higher denomination, the agent testified.
The agent also identified equipment, including a color scanner and laptop computer, found during the search of a Gloucester Township motel room, that were believed to have been used in the forgeries, authorities said.
Martin was charged with passing two fake $20 bills at a Washington Township McDonald’s restaurant drive-through window on Sept. 1, 2011.
“There is a lot of evidence,” Assistant Gloucester County Prosecutor Michelle Jeneby told the jury in her closing statement. “We caught him literally in the act.”
Martin also gave a statement after arrest acknowledging he presented the phony bills to get real money as change, Jeneby said.
Sentencing is scheduled for April 24. Martin remains in jail in default of bail.