The Roaches Corner is at it again

[gnaz01]

Check out this "Lincoln" Letter Gotta love that it is TTA certified and valued into the "hundreds"

http://www.myccsa.com/lot/219/abraha...64-letter.aspx

[RichardSimon]

"the ink appears brownish red due to the fake aging that one of our expert consignors can expertly do"
to paraphrase from the ad for the Lincoln.
btw - I received an e mail, anonymous of course, with the names of three people in it,allegedly the consignors who forge for the Roaches. None of the names are a surprise to me. Of course without proof I won't name them here, but this is the second time I have received such an e mail and the names are the same, except the first e mail contained four names. The fourth name was quite a surprise and I am not surprised that the recent e mail did not name that person.

The names are not from the Everglades btw. I know that some or all of you will understand that reference.

[thetruthisoutthere]

According to John Reznikoff, a genuine Abraham Lincoln signed letter similar to this one would sell for between $15,000 and $25,000.

The above is up to a whopping $471.00. As you can see, all of the collectors of historical signatures are flocking to it in droves.

It is "Fully Ted Taylor certified; this is a one of a kind item values well into the hundreds!" "Well into the hundreds!!!"

What do Scott Malack and Lee Trythall mean by "Fully Ted Taylor certified?"

Ted Taylor and Jeff Stevens had to decide awhile back whether to run a hot dog stand or get into the authentication business. And he's "authenticating" a Abraham Lincoln signed letter!!! Are you kidding me!!!!

[gnaz01]

Originally Posted by thetruthisoutthere

According to John Reznikoff, a genuine Abraham Lincoln signed letter similar to this one would sell for between $15,000 and $25,000.

The above is up to a whopping $471.00. As you can see, all of the collectors of historical signatures are flocking to it in droves.

It is "Fully Ted Taylor certified; this is a one of a kind item values well into the hundreds!" "Well into the hundreds!!!"

What do Scott Malack and Lee Trythall mean by "Fully Ted Taylor certified?"

Ted Taylor and Jeff Stevens had to decide awhile back whether to run a hot dog stand or get into the authentication business. And he's "authenticating" a Abraham Lincoln signed letter!!! Are you kidding me!!!!

I knew by posting this it would bring out Rich and Chris
I love posting on the

[thetruthisoutthere]

I'd like to know the amount of time Ted Taylor (TTA) spent "Fully Certifying" that Abraham Lincoln signed letter?

I would guess that an expert on historical documents like John Reznikoff would spend hours on a historical document before authenticating it, unless, of course, it was an obvious forgery.

[gnaz01]

Darn iPad doesn't let you edit properly

I meant to say I love hearing Rich and Chris speak as I feel the same way they do. I own an original Lincoln affixed seal I bought in the the Forbes auction, and I paid much more than the "hundreds" Lee and Scott claim

When does it stop??????

[bbcard1]

I recently bought a Lincoln letter signed in sharpie. It's cool. I estimate its value in the tens.

[gnaz01]

Originally Posted by bbcard1

I recently bought a Lincoln letter signed in sharpie. It's cool. I estimate its value in the tens.

To quote Larry the Cable Guy "I don't care who you are that's funny right thar"

[thetruthisoutthere]

Below is a direct quote that I received from Mr. John Reznikoff in reference to the above Abraham Lincoln we are discussing here:

Anywhere from 1 minute to days depending on a number of factors. In my opinion I could find 100 reputable dealers, top ones, that would take less than 1 minute to decide on this one. We both know what that decision would be, and it would be consistent with all 100. You can quote me

[GrayGhost]

Not to mention, that for such a "successful" auction house. , they can't afford to take good quality pictures.

Now, I ask you, why would this, or any hi dollar piece the Roaches have, be blurry? I can only wonder.

[thecatspajamas]

Better to draw in unsuspecting bidders (who are not members of this board, obviously) who think they have found something for nothing. If they showed their crap clearly, you'd see what a turd really looks like.

How in the world do they continue to get away with all the forgeries? There are laws against that sort of thing, right? As blatant as some of their junk is, and as long and often as it has been discussed, poked, prodded and made fun of here on the boards to the point that you can just use "cc" as the punchline to whatever forgery joke you want to make, how are they allowed to continue? Even if they only get a couple hundred dollars for a fake item that would be worth thousands if it were real, that's still a couple hundred dollars more than they should get that was taken out of some naive bidder's pocket, right? And once they've sold it, that crap is out there to continue to cause problems down the road. You might be able to pee in the pool once or twice and get away with it, but it seems like if you routinely take a dump in the deep end, sooner or later someone would get sick of swimming in your sewage to forcibly eject you from the pool...

[GrayGhost]

Rather harsh analogy, but so true. I still would like to know how the wheels could be set in motion to get these clowns put out of business. There are so many things wrong with this whole deal. Plus, people need to educate themselves on what they are buying as well. Sad sad sad situation.

[sports-rings]

when I see that bids there go into the hundreds for this junk, i truly hope some of that is Coach's corner doing shell bidding too.

I can't beleive this has gone on as long as it has. Too bad 60 minutes or Real Sports doesn't do an investigative piece on them.

[ruth-gehrig]

Aren't there some attorneys or lawyers on the board that could offer advice as to what exactly it would take to get them shut down? What laws are they breaking? It's quite obvious to us their entire operation is a scam. Since letters of authenticity are opinions if it came down to a lawsuit over an autograph why couldn't the authenticator just say, "whoops my mistake i honestly believed it was the real deal based on my experience" and be off the hook? And the auction house just say they were selling it because the authenticator said it was legit? IMO to bring them down one of the forgers would have to rat em out but why would they want to because they have to be banking big time as well. Why would you bite the hand that continually feeds you?

[keithsky]

They'll never get busted because of what you stated with there cert and wording of IN OUR OPINION. All of the authenticators use the same wording to get out of being responsible. Third party grading is a joke. I can give an opinion and everyone on this board can but are we getting paid for it? Don't think so and they are and making a bag of money. It's like being a weather guy. I think it might rain today. You don't have to be right but you still get paid cause it's your opinion. We all have been complaining about C.C for years and they still continue to operate. It baffles me to see the same crap every auction and people still think they are getting a bargain. Operation Bullpen was supposed to clean up the hobby and maybe it did a little at the time but now there is C.C putting out questionable stuff that needs to be looked into. Wish the Feds would look into it but I'm sure there is more pressing things than C.C. Maybe there will be an attorney on this site that would offer up some thoughts about C.C

[sports-rings]

perhaps if us collectors pulled our resources together, we could start a class action suit against them. we would claim they damage the hobby and our collections by flooding the market with garbage and furthermore, they drive their victims from the hobby and that results in lower values of autographs.

If we did multiple lawsuits, we could probibly bankrupt them. We could even do multiple lawsuits againt their authenticators and drive them from the hobby.

Just like with OJ, it may be a lot easier to prove damages, in a civil lawsuit, then the government trying to prove and win a criminal conviction.

[Mr. Zipper]

They are just so "in your face" and blatant with the flood of fakes coming through eBay and elsewhere, I have to believe that there are investigations underway that will wipe out these cockroaches. The FBI doesn't take well to criminals thumbing their noses a few short years after one investigation closes.

The FBI got a ton of good press and goodwill out of Operation Bullpen... there's nothing stopping them from doing it again.

[ruth-gehrig]

Wouldn't it be funny if during the course of a lawsuit C.C was served with a subpoena to produce consigner records??

[mdschulze]

What the hell kind of experience and/or education must one have to become a professional authenticator? I just may start my own family business... have my 9 yr old sign "Babe Ruth" all day long, print the certificate, then off to the auction it goes! Get rich quick??

[sports-rings]

Someone earlier in this post asked if any lawyers could provide their input on this matter.

I will pledge $1,000 for a class action suit. If we could get 5 - 10 or more to join would we be able to do this?

Anyone else interested in joining?

[RichardSimon]

Just a guess here, but I don't think this can qualify as a class action.
I think if you got a bunch of their buyers that could easily qualify for a class action.

[Mr. Zipper]

Originally Posted by RichardSimon

Just a guess here, but I don't think this can qualify as a class action.
I think if you got a bunch of their buyers that could easily qualify for a class action.

I think the OP was suggesting that the community could have legal standing as all of our collections have been "damaged" by the flood of fakes. In effect, we are victims as well as those who actually purchased the junk.

Probably a stretch, but I suspect weaker legal cases have been filed.

[thecatspajamas]

I agree with Richard that proving damage to the collecting community at large would be much more of a long shot than getting together a group of buyers. Though how would you go about contacting those buyers? If you got the first one on board, could you subpoena their bidding records in order to contact others? (This is me thinking out loud, but not being at all sure about the legal process).

That does bring to mind the question of if/when these forgeries have resurfaced elsewhere in the hobby. Not necessarily through other reputable auction houses, but more likely on eBay. Anyone seen them offered? Or are they still hanging on unsuspecting buyers' man cave walls?

Personally, if I was the victim and innocently trying to flip the item for profit, I would rather be invited to join a class action suit against the auction house/authenticator than just a rude e-mail telling me my item was fake. (Not sure if that makes sense reading back over it, but hopefully you get my meaning).

[sports-rings]

If Coachs corner and their authenticators faced multiple lawsuits this story would hit the media sites. Then others would join in the suits.

Would this drive them out of business as defending against multiple lawsuits would be very expensive?

[RichardSimon]

Michael - I think the Roaches could easily have your type of lawsuit dismissed. It is expensive to defend but 1000 bucks apiece from 5-10 guys won't last very long with the attorney you hire. Believe me, I speak from experience.
Nice idea, but impractical.

[sports-rings]

thanks for the post Richard,

what if this class action suit hit the press and it became 50 people x $1,000
who were collectors, or victims of their previous few hundred auctions?

what if it included the authenticators?

Also, when the number of people involved in the class action suit grows, don't lawyers usually get more inclined to take on the case?

I know very little about law, so I was wondering, on what grounds would they be able to have the lawsuit dismissed?

[Mr. Zipper]

If I am not mistaken, Class Action attorneys typically work on contingency. So, someone would have to sell a firm on the concept... the firm would then place advertisements looking for people to join the suit.

The problem is this -- Coaches Corner does not have the deep pockets of pharmaceutical company. Class Action law firms take RX cases because the potential payoff from years of work is tens of millions of dollars. What is any law firm going to get from Coaches Corner other than a bankrupcy filing?

[ruth-gehrig]

I love to hear what an attorney would say about this situation.