David Grann on St. Clair McKelway's "Old Eight Eighty"

"It seemed no more than a curious footnote-a counterfeiter so outlandishly inept that his forged dollar bills were detectable even at a casual glance. Nearly all were emblazoned with a telltale flaw: the name of America's first President was spelled "Wahsington." The scammer, who operated in the New York area from 1938 to 1948, was known to the often exasperated agents of the U.S. Secret Service as No. 880, for the number of his case file."

"Unlike his more masterly criminal brethren, he never posed a threat to the sanctity of the financial system at large. He produced only dollar bills, and only forty or so of them each month, enough to provide himself and his dog with a few supplies. (The bogus currency was easily passed off, because who inspects a dollar bill?) The Secret Service spent years searching for No. 880."

"Who was this irritant who had eluded the most sophisticated lawmen in the country, thanks to the triviality of his crimes? In the end, No. 880 was found only because a fire broke out in his apartment, and, as a result, the tools of his criminality-including a zinc engraving plate with the misspelled word "Wahsington"-were thrown out the window and discovered by children playing in the neighborhood. No. 880 cheerfully admitted his misdeeds when confronted by the Secret Service agents, who were taken aback to discover that their bête noire was a sweet-tempered, toothless elderly widower called Edward Mueller."

From 1938 to 1948 a New York-area counterfeiter known as No. 880 produced roughly forty counterfeit one-dollar bills monthly, each bearing the misspelled 'Wahsington.' His crude forgery nonetheless circulated because dollar bills are seldom inspected. The U.S. Secret Service pursued him for years without success. A fire in his apartment led to the discovery of his zinc engraving plate when children found it among items thrown from the window. Confronted by agents, he admitted the crimes; he was revealed to be Edward Mueller, a sweet-tempered, toothless elderly widower who used the proceeds to support himself and his dog.

Read at The New Yorker