Frank Abagnale - Catch Me If You Can

There was a fellow beside me filling out a deposit slip. I noticed he neglected to give his account number. I dawdled in the bank for nearly an hour and watched those who came in to deposit cash, checks or credit-card vouchers. Not one in twenty, if that many, used the space provided for his or her account number.

I forgot about the girl. I surreptitiously pocketed a sheaf of the deposit slips, returned to my apartment and, using press-on numerals matching the type face on the bank forms, filled in the blank on each slip with my own account number.

The following morning, I returned to the bank and just as stealthily put the sheaf of deposit slips back in a slot atop a stack of others. I didn’t know if my ploy would succeed or not, but it was worth a risk. Four days later I returned to the bank and made a $250 deposit. “By the way, what’s my balance, please?” I asked the teller. “I forgot to enter some checks I wrote this week.”

The teller obligingly called bookkeeping. “Your balance, including this deposit, is $42,876.45, Mr. Williams,” she said.

Just before the bank closed, I returned and drew out $40,000 in a cashier’s check, explaining I was buying a home. I didn’t buy a home, of course, but I sure did feather my nest. The next morning I cashed the check at another bank and that afternoon flew to Honolulu, where a pretty Hawaiian girl greeted me with a kiss and put a lei around my neck.

I was a cad when it came to reciprocating. During the next two weeks I fashioned a $38,000 lei of fraudulent checks, spent three days hanging it around the necks of banks and hotels on the islands of Oahu, Hawaii, Maui and Kauai, and then jetted to New York.

It was the first time I’d been back in New York since hitting the paperhanger’s trail, and I was tempted to call Mom and Dad and maybe even see them. I decided against any such action, however, as much from shame as anything else. I might return home a financial success beyond either Mom’s or Dad’s comprehension, but mine was not the kind of success either of them would appreciate or condone.

I stayed in New York just long enough to devise a new scam. I opened a checking account in one of the Chase Manhattan branches, and when I received my personalized checks, in the name of Frank Adams, with the address of an East Side flat I’d rented, I flew to Philadelphia and scouted the city’s banks. I selected one with an all-glass front, enabling prospective depositors to see all the action inside and providing the bank officers, whose desks lined the glass wall, with a* good view of the cash inflow.

I wanted them to have a very pleasant view of me, so I arrived the next morning in a Rolls-Royce driven by a chauffeur I had hired for the occasion.

As the chauffeur opened the door for me, I saw one of the bank officers had indeed noticed my arrival. When I entered the bank, I walked directly to him. I had dressed befitting a man with a chauffeured Rolls-Royce-custom-tailored three-piece suit in pearl gray, a $100 homburg and alligator Ballys-and the look in his eyes told me the young banker recognized my grooming as another indication of wealth and power.

“Good morning,” I said briskly, taking a seat in front of his desk. “My name is Frank Adams, Adams Construction Company of New York. We’ll be doing three construction projects here during the year and I want to transfer some funds here from my New York bank. I want to open a checking account with you people.”

“Yes, sir!” he replied enthusiastically, reaching for some forms. “Will you be transferring all your funds here, Mr. Adams?”

“As far as my personal funds are concerned, yes,” I said. “I’m not sure about the company funds as yet, and won’t be until I look closer at the projects, but in any event we’ll want to place a substantial amount here.”

“Well, for your personal account, Mr. Adams, all you have to do is write me a check for the remaining balance in your New York bank and that will close that account out.”

“Is that all?” I said, feigning surprise. “I didn’t realize it was that simple.” I took my checkbook from my inside pocket and, holding it so he couldn’t see it, ran my finger down an imaginary column of figures, murmuring. Then I looked up at him. “May I use your adding machine, please? I wrote some checks yesterday and didn’t balance my checkbook and I’m not much on adding figures in my head.”

“Certainly,” he said and turned the machine for my use. I ran a few figures and then nodded.

“Well, I make my balance $17,876.28, and I’m sure that’s correct,” I said. “But let’s just open an account for $17,000. I’ll be going back to New York on occasion and I’d like to maintain a small balance there.”

I wrote him a check for $17,000 and gave him the necessary information for setting up an account. I gave my address as the hotel where I had registered. “I’ll be staying there until I can find a suitable apartment or house to lease,” I said.

The young banker nodded. “You realize, of course, Mr. Adams, you can’t write any checks on your account until your check has cleared in New York,” he said. “That shouldn’t take over four or five days, however, and in the meantime if you run short of funds, come to me and I’ll take care of it. Here are some temporary checks for such an event.”

I shook my head. “That’s kind of you, but I anticipated the delay,” I said. “I have ample funds for my needs.”

I shook hands with him and left. That night I flew to Miami and the following afternoon I appeared in front of another glass-fronted bank, again in a Rolls-Royce but at the wheel myself, and casually but again expensively attired. I glanced at my watch as I entered the lobby. The Philadelphia bank would be open for another thirty minutes. A strikingly handsome and chicly dressed woman who had noted my arrival greeted me as I stepped into the lobby.

“May I help you, sir?” she asked, smiling. On closer inspection she was much older than I had first thought, but she was still an alluring woman.

“I hope so,” I said, returning the smile. “But I think I’d better speak to the bank manager.”

Her eyes lit impishly. “I am the bank manager,” she said, laughing. “Now, what’s your problem? You certainly don’t appear to need a loan.”

I threw up my hands in mock defeat. “No, no, nothing like that,” I said. “My name’s Frank Adams and I’m from Philadelphia and I’ve been looking around Miami for years for a suitable vacation home. Well, today I found a fantastic deal, a floating house near Biscayne Bay, but the man wants cash and he wants a $15,000 deposit by five o’clock today. He won’t take a personal check and I don’t have a bank account here.

“I’m wondering, could I write you a check on my bank in Philadelphia and you issue me a cashier’s check, payable to cash, for $15,000? I realize you’ll have to call my bank to verify that I have the money, but I’ll pay for the call. I really want this house. It would mean I could spend half my time down here.” I paused, a pleading look on my face.

She pursed her lips prettily. “What’s the name of your bank in Philadelphia, and your account number?” she asked. I gave her the name of the bank, the telephone number and my account number. She walked to a desk and, picking up the telephone, called Philadelphia.

“Bookkeeping, please,” she said when she was connected. Then: “Yes, I have a check here, drawn on account number 505-602, Mr. Frank Adams, in the amount of $15,000.1 would like to verify the check, please.”

I held my breath, suddenly aware of the burly bank guard standing in one corner of the lobby. It had been my experience that clerks in bank bookkeeping departments, when asked to verify a check, merely looked at the balance.