Arthur J. Williams Jr. is a Chicago counterfeiter turned artist who learned the trade as a teenager from a printer nicknamed “Da Vinci.” When the US Treasury introduced a redesigned $100 bill in 1996, Williams reverse-engineered its security features using hand-drawn watermarks, automotive paint for the colour-shifting ink and thin paper obtained from the ends of newsprint rolls. His bills passed through banks and casinos, and he is estimated to have printed around $10 million over a decade
Arthur J. Williams Jr.
