Using a fake ID is like playing a game of Russian Roulette that many Iowa State students who are minors play every weekend, but most fake- ID users will end up biting the bullet.

“Every semester the police officers give a 45-minute presentation on how to check for fake IDs,” Matt Lester, a bartender at People’s Bar and Grill, said.

“We have a book that has every ID in the country, so if you come in with an ID from Hawaii we’ll know what we’re looking for.”

Bartenders in Ames are on the lookout for fake IDs and usually confiscate between two and three a week. Still, sometimes fake IDs are difficult to spot.

The new Iowa IDs that were once thought to be tamper-proof have images that can be rubbed off, leaving bartenders suspicious.

“The pictures rub off easily and they’re almost worse,” Lester said.

Sometimes bartenders can look at height, eye color and weight to check suspicious ID’s for accuracy. When in doubt, bartenders will ask the card holder questions about information on the ID.

“There was this one guy with an ID that read that he was 6 feet 3 inches tall. I’m six foot, and this guy was a few inches shorter than me,” Paul Devries, manager of Cy’s Roost, said.

Devries said he continued to question the card holder with information on the ID.

“I asked him his social security number, and he didn’t know it. Then I asked him his zip code; he didn’t know that either,” he said. “So I asked him where he was from. He told me he was from Cedar Rapids. So I asked him why his ID said Marshalltown.”

Devries said he put that ID in his pocket.

Bartenders who catch fake IDs keep the ID and tell the holder to leave. They then turn in their collected fake IDs to the police for investigation.

Local bars receive “brownie points” from Ames Police for the collection and handing over of fake ID’s. Lester said this act may help improve the odds of their liquor license being renewed.

Lester said the most difficult fakes to spot are the real IDs of legal age students used by minors.

Minors who get past a bartender with a fake shouldn’t breath a sigh of relief. Bar patrol officers who are shown fake IDs by minors will issue them costly fines.

If caught, a minor using someone else’s ID or a fake ID can be charged with false identification, an on-the-premises charge, a city ordinance charge or a state traffic violation.

Charges range from $90 to $112, with the possibility of license revocation.

Minors using a fake can have their real license revoked in the same manner as done with drunk drivers.

Tom Oxley, of the Ames police department, said the cost of getting the license back is about $100.

Some students may try to get a fake ID through the Ames Department of Transportation, a move definitely not worth the risk.

“On Dec. 26 we had some change on what we accept for receiving a license,” Mark Voss, a public supervisor, said.

In order to receive a new drivers license or duplicate license one must present a city or county birth certificate, a passport or an out-of-state drivers license, Voss said.

The amount of suspicious cases reported at the drivers license office is relatively small.

The cases that evoke question are reported to Iowa’s Department of Transportation Investigator, Voss said.

“This is pretty serious,” Voss said.

The charge for a person who attempts to create a fake ID using false information can be charged with purgery, which is a Class B felony. Purgery charges range from a $7,500 fine up to five years in prison, Voss said.