PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - A Rhode Island man who proclaimed himself the “world’s greatest counterfeiter” has died just weeks after his release from his latest prison sentence.
The Providence Journal reports Louis “The Coin” Colavecchio died Monday in hospice care after dealing with a range of ailments, including dementia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He was 78.
“If he used the amount of ingenuity and knowledge he had for good, he could have been a millionaire and changed people’s lives,” former Rhode Island State Police Col. Steven O’Donnell told the newspaper.
Colavecchio, a North Providence native and Providence College graduate, was infamously banned at nearly every casino in America for counterfeiting gambling tokens.
He was released from federal prison in North Carolina in late May after being sentenced to 15 months for producing counterfeit $100 bills last year.
Colavecchio frustrated casinos for years with counterfeit slot machine tokens. He was arrested at Caesars Atlantic City in 1996 with 800 pounds (360 kilograms) of the fake tokens. His 2015 autobiography, “You Thought it was More, Adventures of the World’s Greatest Counterfeiter,” details his exploits.
During his sentencing in Providence federal court last year, Colavecchio said he was attending community college and still believed he could “do some good” for society.
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