smurfing
n.— «Because tellers have become more suspicious of transactions just under $10,000, the size of the launderer’s deposits is going down steadily, to $7,000 and even $5,000. The smaller the amounts, the more herculean the task. But the “smurfs,” couriers who make the deposits, have proved to be remarkably prolific.…To be more efficient, smurfs target areas where several banks are close to each other and, like most people, they avoid busy banks. “There is very little smurfing in New York City,” says Charles Saphos, an Assistant U. S. Attorney in Florida, “because the lines are too long.”» —“Money Laundering—Who’s Involved, How It Works, And Where It’s Spreading” Business Week (New York City) March 18, 1985. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
What if, instead of being an inanimate object, a dictionary were alive? That’s the idea behind a lavishly illustrated new children’s book called The Dictionary Story (Bookshop|Amazon) by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston. This is part of a...
Chad in Hilliard, Florida, wonders about the expression old as Methuselah, meaning “extremely advanced in years.” The phrase references Methuselah, a figure in Jewish, Islamic, and Christian tradition said to be 969 years old when he...