Women Tried To Use $1 Million Bill At Dollar Store

APRIL 14--Two women sought to use a $1 million bill to purchase merchandise at a Dollar General store in Tennessee, police report.

According to investigators, the duo appeared last Monday morning  at the convenience store in Maryville, a Knoxville suburb. Their attempt to use the counterfeit bill was thwarted by a sentient Dollar General employee who called the cops.

A sheriff’s deputy dispatched to the Dollar General for a “suspicious incident,” spoke with Amanda McCormick, 39, who possessed the counterfeit bill. McCormick, who lives about four miles from the store, was accompanied by a relative, Linda Johnson, 61.

McCormick (seen at right) told the cop that she received the $1 million bill “in the mail from a church,” but was unable to provide additional information about the purported house of worship's largesse, as first reported by The Daily Times.

As detailed in a Blount County Sheriff’s Office report, McCormick had a “shopping cart full of various items from inside the store, including several gift cards to various businesses.” McCormick claimed she was “going to use the money to purchase items for care packages for homeless individuals.”

When questioned by the deputy, Johnson disavowed knowledge of the $1 million bill and said she “was only riding with Ms. McCormick to run errands today.”

While the incident was classified by the sheriff’s office as “fraud by false pretenses,” McCormick and Johnson were not arrested. Instead, they were “issued a verbal no trespass warning” prohibiting them from returning to the Dollar General store.   

The counterfeit bill was confiscated by police and placed into evidence.

Sadly, the police report does not address several obvious questions: Why did McCormick think a church would give her a million bucks? Was McCormick actually under the impression that the United States Mint has produced $1 million bills? Did she plan on loading the gift cards with six-digit sums? Or did she expect the Dollar General (pictured below) to make change? (1 page)