Autograph News Live - criminals or just cowards?

[thetruthisoutthere]

http://www.suntimes.com/news/zimmerm...er-beware.html

[HRBAKER]

Originally Posted by thetruthisoutthere

http://www.suntimes.com/news/zimmerm...er-beware.html

The writer is a master of understatement:


In working on your problem, the Fixer found numerous tales in the memorabilia industry of forged signatures, questionable authentications and unpaid debts. This is an industry in need of watchdogs. There’s an old journalism saying that if your mother says she loves you, check it out. That goes double for anyone selling a Babe Ruth autograph.

[Big Dave]

Victor has been known for last 15 years as a pos crook. Any one that has been in this business for awhile knows that AMI was nothing but a ponzi scam. Victor and Kieta have lived very well on the money owed their consignors. They used money from new consigments sold to pay toward older consignors. Always wondered why people kept consigning to that place when it was well known over a decade ago how they operated. They should have been in jail a long time ago.

[Duluth Eskimo]

I always wondered the same thing. When I used to set up at shows, my booth at the Sun Times show was about 50 feet from the American Memorabilia booth. Every show I would see people wander in and make their way over to Victor's booth. I also used to see people I somewhat respected speaking to him. I would always think, what in the hell are they doing??? The guy is a crook. Why would people even speak to this guy? Then I would see some poor schlep showing him quality game worn (real no less) merchandise for consignment. It was mind boggling. Anyways, enough said.

One other thing. Am I the only one who think Mr Frost's post is a little patronizing? It seems like he thinks this is day one in the autograph community for some. I would consider this a pretty advanced crowd to come in to with this type of post. Maybe I am just blowing it out of proportion. Again, enough said.

[thetruthisoutthere]

Originally Posted by Duluth Eskimo

One other thing. Am I the only one who think Mr Frost's post is a little patronizing?

Nope.

[thetruthisoutthere]

I don't want everyone thinking that Mr. Frost is a white knight looking to save the hobby.

[RichardSimon]

Victor Moreno is a piece of work, no doubt about it.
The negative stories about AMI are all over the internet. It certainly appears that they have left many consignors holding the bag.
When PAAS was formed Victor was a part of it but certainly not in an authenticating way, I wanted to make that very clear.
Three of us authenticated for the AMI catalog ,and constantly battled with Victor and Kieta, until we could establish our independence about authentication without them trying to influence us.
The idea eventually emerged that we should set up a TPA company and Victor was going to handle the advertising and the finances for the advertising.
That advertising effort was sorely lacking and was one of the factors causing PAAS and AMI to split up.
The authenticating company stayed together for a while and for a variety of reasons I decided to leave PAAS after a few months.
Mike Frost and Steve Koschal kept PAAS together for a period of time, I don't really remember how long, but eventually as you see they had a falling out.