By Chicago Times Magazine –

February 07, 2025

A Chicago man has been sentenced to more than seven years in federal prison for manufacturing counterfeit $100 bills and using them in retail stores. Marquise Shores, 28, used chemicals and a printer in his Chicago residence to produce approximately $92,000 in fake currency.

Shores then used Facebook Messenger to recruit young women, including girls as young as 16, to use the counterfeit bills to purchase merchandise at retail stores while he waited outside. He instructed the women to return the merchandise for genuine currency, which Shores then kept for himself.

Shores pleaded guilty last year to a federal counterfeiting charge. U.S. District Judge Virginia M. Kendall sentenced him on Wednesday to seven years and three months in prison.

The sentence was announced by Morris Pasqual, Acting United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and Dai Tran, Special Agent in Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the U.S. Secret Service. The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kurt Siegal.