A 78-year-old Florida woman tried to fly on an international trip to the Philippines from Detroit Metropolitan Airport with almost $41,000 in cash hidden inside her girdle, bra and carry-on bag, federal authorities said.

Federal law requires travelers to declare if they are carrying more than $10,000. The woman hasn't been charged, but the government in the forfeiture complaint said it wants to keep the money.

Forfeiture is the standard as well as a charge of failing to declare taking >$10,000 in and out of the country. IRS is then notified and then they can get to work.

Departing TPAC with DL from DTW there is always CBP agents asking question in the jetway. The question seem to concentrate around amount of cash and negotiable instruments.

One curious question related to this - what is the situation in Europe - do they still issue bearer bonds? In US they've been outlawed for more than 32 years already...

TPAC flights are targeted due to Ben Franklin portraits in mint condition are very welcomed in Philippines. Money changer will pay premium for new bills.

Flights to AMS are also rather frequent targets for this, from ORD and DTW at least.

If the woman had used 500EUR notes, stuffed them in her bra and been consistent in her deception/misleading of CBP, it's unlikely she would have been flagged down absent CBP being fed info by Treasury about the passenger and/or some companion.

If the funds were legitimately sourced -- and I don't know why they should be considered anything but such -- she got nailed on the basis of a legal requirement that is unknown to most persons in the country: the requirement to file paperwork on Fincen 105 when having currency and/or select financial instruments with a value of $10,000 US or more and taking it out of the country.

The law actually goes beyond that. If you are transferring $10k or more on a wire transfer you must report it. If you transfer to or from your US bank, they will report it without asking you.

The law originally started as an effort to fight cash moving around for drug dealers. But it also helps with money laundering and tax cheats.

The fact that this woman had it stuffed in her girdle makes it pretty clear she knew it was illegal.

The $10K limit was decided upon in the 1970s and it has never been adjusted for inflation.

She only needed to fill out the paper-work before boarding and she would have been fine.

Let me just mention without details that I know two Filipino passengers who did not heed my advise about this and was caught. One in ATL and the other in DTW.

Besides losing the failed to declare funds they were subjected to the full IRS treatment. One was clean and the other was not.

-30-

Exactly, with the appropriate details.

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What's the reason for that?

Same is true is Myanmar. I never did figure out why. My guess is that the $100 bills eventually go somewhere else to finance some kind of smuggling or illegal trade, and the Franklins are easier to carry than $20's.

Several years ago a forfeiture was overturned on a very long appeal process filed by the man who lost his money:

An Iranian businessman owned a chain of independent gas stations in Southern California. He decided to repatriate profits of something like a million in US currency by taking it with him on a flight back home.

No paperwork. The entire amount was confiscated and he was fined something like $1,000 because that was the penalty for not declaring it. Turns out the money was 100% legit and taxes paid.

Appeal decision he eventually won said the forfeiture was disproportionate to the penalty. Minus his legal costs and the fine, and after several years of a legal fight with the govt, the man got the forfeiture returned.

The people in these latest cases lost a lot of cash, but probably not nearly enough for a lengthy legal flight to get it back -- and that's assuming the money is legitimate. Sad.

The new $100 bills are considered better protected from counterfeit confusion than the other versions of the $100 bill; and it is better protected from counterfeit confusion than the $50 or $20 bills; and also smaller bills being a smaller store of value means more volume for any given large value.

If volume is the issue, the 500 euro note is more efficient than $100 US notes.