MovieChat Forums > 21 (2008) Discussion > Money in the ceiling!!!!

Money in the ceiling!!!!

posted 14 years ago by footballwomenvodka
24 replies | jump to latest

I know many people keep huge sums of money at home but would YOU keep $315000.00 in your dorm at uni? That's a lot different than keeping it at home. Of course if Ben had put the money in the best place, a bank, Spacey wouldn't have been able to steal it leading to him being set up. And wouldn't the best thing to do if you could count cards be to win $100000 in one casino, then a week later do the same in another and so on until you'd made a few million, then quit and live a life of luxury?

BBSS
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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] cheezmunky 14 years ago

If you're winning a mil in casinos every weekend, you can forget about ever going back to Vegas.

Facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything that's even remotely true!

[–] 14 years ago

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[–] scenoid 13 years ago

Yes the bank would report anything over $10,000 to the IRS, but keeping the money in a Safe Deposit Box at the bank wouldn't be such a bad idea.

These Hollywood Harvard/MIT people are soo dumb these days.

[–] 13 years ago

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[–] ChristopherNolanIsAHack 13 years ago

A safer place would be in his mom's house. Bank-Bad Idea or else you get reported to the IRS, Safe Deposit Box is too small. But anyway Im not sure if Harward would accept stacks of hundred dollar bills without asking questions or reporting it to the police.

[–] AltaireIII 13 years ago

A bank is not a problem if you are going to report your winnings on your tax return. Let the bank issue Currency Tranaction Reports all it wants to the IRS. The IRS doesn't do anything with them until they:

1. Receive a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) from the bank. Not all SAR's are acted on becuase suspicous activity can be very subjective.

OR

2. Have an audit in process and the IRS checks for filed CTR's as a matter or audit prep.

I don't recommend stashing money in a safe deposit box. TOo many trips to the box can tip the bank employees off. Drug dealers who are stashing money so it can be laundered may use safe deposit boxes to keep it safe. They get tripped up by making too many trips to the box. How do you prove $300K in your safe deposit box did not come from dealing drugs?

In the book the people on this card counting team did declare the income on their tax returns. One of them was audited and got through it with no trouble. That's the smart way to play it because people go to prison for tax evasion. The IRS doesn't care if they cashed in by card counting. It's not an illegal act and if it were it is not a reportable act under the Code of Internal Revenue. The only reportable act under the Code is drug tafficing.

[–] Sam-953-169285 7 years ago

I don't know when it was that he was supposedly putting the money in the ceiling but the procedures of the bank and the IRS must be described in terms of that time instead of what they were in 2011.

[–] Lakemystery3 13 years ago

Like anothe poster said, let the bank report to the IRS. If he's winning that much in Vegas, he has to fill out paperwork at the casino stating how much he won anyway, so putting it in the bank is okay.

_______
"She flattened a Dear John with a John Deere." - Douglas Wambaugh

[–] movie_fan59 13 years ago

Wow, read your post and a light bulb went off in my head, something that I should have thought of when sitting in the theater. Just how did they cash in all those chips without having to produce identification and fill out the required paperwork for the IRS for cash transactions of such large amounts?

[–] shurbanm 12 years ago

Did you not watch the movie. They had strippers cash them in at least once.

[–] JohnGaltJunior 11 years ago

Table games (those with odds under 300-1) do NOT get the gambler automatically issued a CTR or a W-2G. Period. It's up to the gambler to file correctly otherwise it's a tax felony. Especially of you cash out your chips $5,000 at a time. I play blackjack high-stakes- $1,000 a hand.

Meanwhile, about the topic, it's ASININE to leave your money in the ceiling. What about a routine robbery, Or a fire.

There are SO many alternative ways of storing cash. A corporate safe deposit box is a great idea. People regularly visit them multiple times a week. A safe in a safe house another. Or like the law says, just report it.

[–] Sam-953-169285 7 years ago

Was that law in affect at the time that the events in the movie occurred? It does not seem logical that he would not use a bank if the casinos knew who they were. In fact, much of the movie does not make sense if they had to identify themselves to the casino. There was a time when we did not have to tell casinos who we were when we won and the events in the movie probably happened before the casinos and the IRS got the laws changed.

[–] shurbanm 12 years ago

you'd be surprised...

[–] lilkunta3 11 years ago

scenoid,
do banks have to report all accounts with over $10,000
or any deposit over $10,000 ?

These Hollywood Harvard/MIT people are soo dumb these days.
not true. the real havard/MIT students did keep the money
(in their laundry basket not the ceiling)in their dorm rooms
for logistics. they flew to NJ and Nevada friday afternoon
& returned on sun night so there was no time for banks.

and some of the students did declare their winnings.
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[–] MrCottonsParrot 13 years ago

The director's commentary reveals it was not because of the IRS that they didn't use a bank or safe deposit box (some SDBs are large). It was because they never had time to go to the bank. The real guy used the laundry basket in his dorm and was not robbed. He did this so he could finish school on the Friday and go straight to Vegas with the money.

"Champagne for my real friends, and real pain for my sham friends..."

[–] 13 years ago

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[–] shurbanm 12 years ago

He could put it in the bank but that would mean he would have made something like 200 or so out of the 315 he deposits. The tax on gambling winnings would put him back quite a bit...

[–] compact_disc_rack 11 years ago

I understand you can't just go to the bank at once with $300 000+, but he didn't make all the money at once, and he could at least have secured the small portions of it that he could have. Like hide about $10 000 in his mom's house, and put another $9000 in the bank etc. That way whatever happens he may still have $20 000 left. Nowhere near what he needed for the med school, but in real life NO ONE other than the filthy rich would look at 20 grand as small potatos not worth caring about.

I wonder one thing about the $10 000 limit thing where banks have to report anything above that.

1. What if you for instance come in with $8000 every month. By the end of the year you will have over $80 000 in the bank. Can this be done or is it just about having over $10 000 in your bank account no matter what?

2. What if you have $9999 in like five different banks? In the Sopranos Carmela did just that.

[–] NeitherHearNorTheir 11 years ago

I'd sleep better if I declared my winnings to the IRS. But if I was in a similar situation as the film's character and didn't want to be in the system, I'm going with the safe deposit box. As others have said, keep some cash at Mom's, a bit in the dorm, but during the week, make a trip to the safety deposit box for the lion's share of the cash.

They said they didn't go to Vegas every single weekend, so if you have a box at a couple different banks, you wouldn't be showing up so often as to cause suspicion.

But the ceiling? Yeah, that obviously wasn't going to work out well.

[–] alifeatthemovies 11 years ago

This leads to another question, namely, how was he planning to use the money? Was he going to show up to Harvard Medical School with $300,000 dollars in a trash bag and say, oh, hey, here is my tuition?

[–] NeitherHearNorTheir 11 years ago

This leads to another question, namely, how was he planning to use the money? Was he going to show up to Harvard Medical School with $300,000 dollars in a trash bag and say, oh, hey, here is my tuition?

LOL, good question. If he isn't going to declare the winnings to the IRS, I know what I would do. That 300,000 is going to be spread out over four years of med school, so I would take out a loan, like everybody else. Then, after med school, when you have to start making payments, then slowly use the hidden winnings to help with the burden of the big loan payments. A nice, slow, gradual thing. Use your income to pay your school loans, but pay cash for groceries, gas, clothes, other amenities, and I don't think you'd draw any attention to yourself. People expect doctors to have nice things, so I think if you spread out the 300,000 over several years of loan payments, it won't be a problem.