An Open Letter to Bill Mastro
 

Hi, my name is Dan Scheinman. I am a former customer of Mastro Auctions and i have been silent until reading this. http://www.cardboardconnection.com/n...tro-fraud-case

I am also one of the largest collector of deadball until the early 1950's game used jerseys. Some of which i purchased from Bill. I opted not to share my experience with the judge because you Bill were pleading guilty and because I assumed that meant you were actually taking responsibility. WRONG.

Essentially, Bill has been living in a parallel universe for the last several years where one of 3 defenses keep coming up. Hey things are worth more now, so what is the issue. And, there are only a small number of people who complain, so I must not have been that bad. The third is the ever popular, these people could afford it (and I promised my consignor a certain price) so who is harmed.

I think both show extreme arrogance and an incredible lack of remorse for the crimes you are supposedly pleading guilty to. In my experience, most if not all of the times i bid in your auctions, the bidding was rigged. What did I experience. Whenever i put in a MAX bid, the winning bid was always my highest bid. There were times when i was a winning bidder, only to see the item go to someone else right at close (or after close). When I called in, I was told that of course Bill looked at things in order to make his consignors (often him and his employees right) and that if I angered Bill, I risked winning nothing.

Bill, you have have demonstrated criminal behavior. You have cheated your clients and friends. The time has come for you to grow up, take accountability and show that you actually understand the damage you have done to this hobby.

dan scheinman

I won several auction items in Mastro auctions and never put a max bid for the items. I guess I'm one of the few that was never shilled. I'm serious about this, never had a problem with shill bidding. This post does not address any items that were not real or accurately described.

Joe

Well, I recall a couple of items that I remember sold for my max bid. But since I have always considered them good buys, I have never felt too steamed about it. Still, if they have proof that he stole from bidders, I don't see what the question is.

I could never seem to win anything from Mastro...always got outbid.

i just read Peter Nash's blog entry on this matter at haulsofshame

Someone posted a great line in the comments section: Even if you were never part of a shill bid, you still lose. (Guess he means shill bidding drives up pricing for the entire hobby)

On a releated note, I hate Hunt Auction's phantom bidding on behalf of the consigner. Maybe someone can explain the difference to me of this practice vs. shill bidding!

I seem to always pay my ceiling bid for Hunt items. It didn't used to be that way. If they are going to shill me in the future (if I even participate in any more of their auctions), they will have to actually outbid me - no more ceiling bids for me.

If I ever got shilled at Mastro, the shilling still never approached my ceiling bids, on average. I got a lot of great deals.

I just want to be clear, I am not accusing Hunt of shill bidding. They have a process where they bid for the consigner until the minimum is met (it's in their auction rules).

if you are a phone bidder during a live auction, you have no idea if you are bidding against a live bidder or Hunt on behalf of their consigner.

I call this Phantom bidding and I no longer wish to bid in their live auctions

I don't like phantom bidding either, though I am sure it's legal when clearly stated in the rules. If you want to do that, just have a reserve and state it. To me, having bidding that is not intended to win the item seems deceiving.

The deceit comes in if you actually think you are engaged in bidding with another party who wants to win it as opposed to say, already owns it. Disclosed or not, slimy. Just say you are having as sale as opposed to an auction.

Hunt's is simply exercising a hidden reserve. Since the auctions are live, the "phantom bidding" is the only way to get the item to meet the consignor's minimum. I can see how it is frustrating for the "real bidder", but it is just an alternate way of establishing a minimum bid amount.

I have never complained to an auction house about strange bids, until I recently paid my ceiling for every single item in a Hunts auction. It was just way too much of a coincidence.

Isn't an alternative way of establishing a minimum amount to set the reserve from the outset? As opposed to having an illusory auction process taking place up to the minimum.

Also, lets remember what Mastro has plead guilty to doing (vs maintaining a minimum bid). He has said he altered materials and lied about it, he has admitting to shill bidding (when there was no minimum and he just felt like the item was too low), and he admited to mail fraud. What he did (particularly on high pieces) was to control the authentication, the pricing and supply. It was done clearly in a way which has violated the law. What you saw early on was that he was contrite and that he was religious. What has come out in the comments to the thread I have posted and in his defense, is that he is defiant and not contrite. He has now claimed his crimes were victimless because everyone made money.
While we may not like the practice of having hidden reserves, it is commonplace in auctions and fully disclosed. What Mastro has confessed to is staggering. The fact that he is posting in comments sections claiming no remorse and that the collectors made money so his crimes are excused is frankly lurid.
I think the major auction houses no longer think like this. My sense is that if there is a hidden reserve it is set at the beginning of the auction. I think most auctions no longer look at the highest price bid and thus remove temptation. We now have disclosure when an auction is selling its own stuff. In general, in most auctions, authentication is separated from the auctioneer. Is it perfect, no. But it is much better than being in a rigged system.

http://www.sportscollectorsdaily.com...ts-sentencing/
Another good story. Mastro's justification is that he was bidding for himself, yah right. He also destroyed records.
Again, if he was contrite I shut up. He is not contrite. He is still justifying his crimes and trying to berate the victims. Way to go Bill.

Mark,

You and I usually see eye-to-eye on most things, but if you're saying that an auction house bidding on an item to exercise a hidden reserve is the same (or even similar) as having a stated, transparent reserve, I disagree. The first practice can falsely imply another "real" bidder is increasing the price of an item, whereas the second practice clearly defines that the auction house/consignor has determined the minimum for which an item will sell.

Big difference, in my opinion.

Rob

Big difference IMO as well

Yes, you are correct. But I think Hunt's thought process is to get more bidders involved by starting the lots low. I think they believe this method will ultimately drive the price higher. I don't love it either...

Yeah, I guess you are right. As a bidder, it does seem a bit sleazy. On the filpside, I've really liked it as a consignor, because it's ensured that I won't get killed on my consignments. I would rather have the lackluster winning bid result in a "no sale" than lose a bunch of money on my consignment.

That said, I agree with you both, that it would be more straight-forward just to just start the item at the lowest acceptable level to the consignor. Heritage does the hidden reserve thing as well (in their own way).

I guess the FBI has a very fine line, in terms of what's "acceptable shilling" and what's criminal.

I see many advertisements for various auction houses in our hobby proclaiming "Now Buying", yet I rarely if ever see disclaimers in their auctions that they own the item.

Am I missing something?

Along the lines of Michael's post above, regarding Mastro - It has not been made clear -who were the owners - of the pieces that were shill bid. In other words, were 20%, 50%, 80% of the pieces that were shill bid owned by the Company? owned by its head? I was never happy with the prices my particular pieces received. If they owned a great number of the pieces that were being shill bid, this would poke a hole also in the idea of - 'trying to do the best for our consignors'.

We live in an accepting society. People in prominent positions as Bill Clinton, Oliver North, Elliot Spitzer, Anthony Wiener, Paula Deen, etc., fall from grace, and following a period of exile, they return refreshed, rejuvenated, and rehabilitated. Some even achieve higher recognition after their return than before. It will be argued that the people who were shilled (including me) got what they wanted, albeit they were overcharged. The Wagner card is not a reproduction or fake; it was simply trimmed years after it was originally produced. Is this fraud? Yes, but less severe than if the card itself was a reproduction. I am not a card collector, but I suspect many card collectors would rather have a trimmed card in their collection than not have the card at all. Now that we definitively know the Wagner card was trimmed, no one is alleging the card is worthless. Collecting tastes and values change over time. Perhaps years from now few will care that a card was trimmed. If I understand how cards are made, at some point in their history all cards were trimmed from sheets. I also will not be surprised if today's villains are accepted back into the hobby after a period of time. I think we place more value on the items in our collections than we have contempt for the people who overcharged us.

Springpin,
I was sort of with you until he attacked a collector on a message board, clearly showing zero remorse. If you believe the FBI, as much as $1m was ripped off consumers. Bill defends by saying that he was legitimately trying to buy the items. Then he attacks people for making money.
Until there is some recognition and remorse, I would not go near him.

What about when Mastro looked at the ceiling bids of his customers and then put in a bid, from his own computer, right below it, ensuring that the bidder lost thousands of dollars (and he made money)?

I would say that's on the wrong side of any "fine line."