|
Fake IDs garner mixed results
By Elliot Mann & Angelene Bombard
Even though many underage students seem to be using fake IDs, few are actually charged with displaying a fradulent driver’s license.
The tools for making fake ID cards are simple. Just typing ‘false identification’ as a keyword on an Internet search reveals a plethora of templates for making fake ID cards.
The only other required tools consist of a scanner, a color printer and a laminator. Using this inexpensive method, people can produce quality cards that are hard to distinguish from real IDs.
Hotbeds
College towns are hotbeds for buying and selling fake ID cards.
One SCSU student, producer and seller of his own false identification cards, says he receives numerous demands for cards.
“I receive phone calls from friends who have a friend who bought a card from me all the time. I have no idea who these people are, but they are willing to pay almost any price,” he said. “My prices are cheaper than the prices in the (Twin) Cities. People are thrilled to hear I only charge $100 for a card. People have spent up to $500 in other areas.”
Why do people spend so much money on these flimsy cards? One SCSU sophomore said she had nothing else to do with her time.
“Being age 20 is the worst,” she said. “All of my friends are old enough to go to the bar and I am not going to be left by myself on a Thursday night.”
Her fake ID is accepted at most bars.
“I don’t know what I would do if I ever lost it,” she said.
Slipping through
Even though signs mark each bar entryway noting “If you’re underage, don’t try,” warning underage drinkers to steer clear, many pass off such signs as a suggestion.
“The first time I went into a bar, I was kind of scared of getting caught but every subsequent time I have gotten more confident,” said one male underage drinker. “I don’t think they check half the people that are going in there.”
Getting bounced
Many people will become more and more confident until the black day when the bouncer gets wise to their bogus ID. Such was the case for one SCSU sophomore.
“I always went into any bar in town, any liquor store without problems. I even gave it to the cops before and they thought it was me,” she said. “The ID was my sister’s so I knew the information and everything, but finally one night at the Carpet my luck ran out.
“The bouncer just told me to get out of there and I did. I was pretty upset about it. I liked to be able to party with my friends that are a year older.”
For others, their fake may be taken at a liquor store.
“I was under 21 at the time, and I went to a liquor store on the East Side of town,” said one SCSU junior. “My fake got taken away and I had used it at bars and other liquor stores, including that one before. After that, I got scared of trying to use one again, so I just waited the months I had to until I was 21.”
To legal bar patrons, the process of handing over your ID to get inside can be tedious.
“I’m 21 and the way they look at my ID at the Carpet, I feel like I’m 12 and trying to sneak in,” said bar hopper Aaron Bergstrom. “I realize it’s necessary though, I mean, I wonder how many fake IDs get taken every night, as well as how many get through.”
Confiscation
While a few underage boozehounds may slip through the cracks, many do not.
“It fluctuates night to night obviously,” said Troy Rahn, Red Carpet Bar and Nightclub manager, “but we usually get a lot of IDs in September, anywhere from none to 10. One past night our security was able to grab 17.”
The Red Carpet requires guests to show a driver’s license, state ID, military ID or passport.
The bars in St. Cloud have many ways of deterring minors. Looking over the pieces of plastic like a hungry person looks over their Thanksgiving turkey is where it starts.
“Our security is highly trained in identifying fake IDs,” Rahn said. “They’re sent to seminars during the year to learn ways of identifying fakes. The computer generated ones, although some are good, are almost always going to get taken.”
At. D.B. Searles it is much the same.
“We have liquor libation meetings that train our personnel in finding the fake IDs,” said Jessica Peterschick, D.B. Searles’ bar manager. “I think the Red Carpet and us are pretty strict on our policies and when the other bars around town aren’t, it makes the quest to deter minors more difficult.”
Rahn agreed.
“It just gives minors the expectation that they can get away with it,” he said. “Minors will try to come in with IDs from people that are six inches taller or stuff like that.”
“Other times, they may try to sweet talk the bouncers,” Peterschick said.
The results, however, are always the same. If they do not have proper ID, they will not get in.
Sometimes minors have a few courage beers and feel like they have to be admitted in.
“Usually the police don’t have to be involved, but they are called at times when a person is being particularly belligerent,” Peterschick said. “Usually the bouncers have the situation under control, but if it is someone who is a repeat offender in one night, then we may involve the police.”
Getting charged
Occasionally, the police are called in regards to persistent people with fake IDs.
“They usually just hand us a big stack of them all at once,” said St. Cloud Police Sergeant Jim Mortenson.
Since Jan. 27, people have been charged with displaying false driver’s licenses in St. Cloud. Only four of these were actually fake IDs. Most people had borrowed an ID from somebody they knew.
It is a misdemeanor both to loan a valid ID to an underage person and to display such an ID — or a fake.
Those who get charged for using a fake or a loaner can be fined up to $1,000 and/or up to 90 days in jail. However, most offenders do not receive steep sentences.
“I wouldn’t count on not getting caught, though,” Mortenson said.
The St. Cloud Police Department is aware that fake IDs are made near SCSU’s campus.
“(Fake ID manufacturers are) extremely difficult to catch,” Mortenson said. “People won’t tell us where they got them from.”
Most of the responsibility for keeping minors out falls on the individual bars.
News Editor Carol Seavey contributed to this story.
|
|
|
|
Privacy Policy Network Advertising Article Syndication
|
|
