Net54baseball.com Forums - the list (of criminals) is revealed

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- - the list (of criminals) is revealed (http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=217245)

Wonder what if any affect this will have on auction houses from here on out?
Most likely none, but lets see.

I have had some email conversations with Rob and I agree with him that I probably should have phrased differently

I do want to say I pointed out in his case that 2002 is far away from 2016 and the split with Mastro may not have occurred year. I don't remember off the top of my head when it did, But there has been an evolution in Rob since the split. It was just interesting he was mentioned but that was 15 years ago and REA did pioneer must of the updated auction software to prevent things like this from occurring.

There is also the matter of who released this information and how and why it was released. *Note -- not the government releasing*.

I will continue to disagree with him that his retirement is not a hobby news story. Look, when you are the head of the most esteemed auction house (look at the REA threads on this board) and the auction carries your name, yeah it's kind of important when you pass the baton. I know Brian, I bought stuff from Brian when he ran Sterling and he was great to deal with. Brian will do fine and I wish Rob all the best in his retirement.

This whole sequence of events is probably just coincidental but an interesting way to start 2016

Rich

PS Peter Spaeth emailed me and asked about why I did not mention Dave Forman -- I pointed out I glanced at this list and did not cover every name.

Someone asked if the victims have been contacted...

I'm on the victim list and have never been contacted.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bruinsfan94 (Post 1496971)

Everyone does something they regret once in a while.

My son's mother :mad: What the hell was I thinking :eek:

Quote:

Originally Posted by AGuinness (Post 1496981)

Garth Guibord
Actually, no. When a reserve is included, the bidders are aware of it. In this case, it's clearly deceptive. It's doesn't take a degree in ethics to see that.

I think the key word is ethics in this statement. Lawyer......ethics............ethics............la wyer.

Just when I was warming up to you Pete......... Please tell me that you're not a family court lawyer though. Then I could care less. Those are the ones that directly piss me off the most.

I think you can basically now be known as the Jason Giambi of this site. You admitted it and thus will take less flack. You will also be commended for owning up to it rather than hiding behind lies. It will be a mute point, it will all blow over. Now I'd like to know who the other's are on the site that aren't owning up !!

Quote:

Originally Posted by botn (Post 1497093)

Over, at least, the last 4 years I was advised and urged to not make a post like this so this comes as a great relief to me that I can finally write this. There is nothing noble in my decision to do this since my name is out there as a consignor with Mastro and associated with items which were identified as shilled but I feel I owe an explanation to those who were harmed and to those who call me a hobby friend. I made a mess so I have to clean it up.
During roughly 2005 to 2009 we consigned a few hundred thousand dollars worth of material to Mastro. Our consignments generally consisted of our more expensive inventory since that type of material did not seem to do as well on eBay—our only other outlet for retail sales AND auction houses like Mastro seemed to be setting record prices. At some point after less than stellar auction results and being completely incensed and frustrated, we decided to protect items rather than allowing them to sell below what we felt were fair values.

At no point did we ever conspire with anyone at Mastro on those bids. We never knew who was bidding on our items or what their bids were. I have no recollection which of our consignments I was the one to place a bid and which my former business partner bid on but since he is no longer here I have to take responsibility for our actions. Sometimes a top all would be placed and other times we would bid incrementally so as to not open ourselves up to being shill bid, as ironic as that might sound. In each instance our bids were made with the intent to buy back the item and a willingness to pay the buyer’s premium, as we did each time we bought back a lot. It did not feel right doing this but I never thought of it as being illegal.

Not to make excuses but the practice described above, of protecting a lot, was very prevalent at that time even among collectors. I will not call out anyone by name but some are current posters here who would frequently ask me to bid up their auction listings on eBay. I now understand why the government considers this shill bidding however our intent with Mastro was never to defraud anyone but to simply protect what was ours. Obviously we should not have consigned if we were not willing to accept that our items might fall far short of our expectations. I cannot take back what I was a part of but I can be a better person going forward. I am sorry to those I harmed and to those who I have disappointed.

As a side note the list may not be as accurate as the government might think. There are a couple errors that I know of in regards to items identified as my consignments according to my records.

Greg

I am completely baffled by this:

"Sometimes a top all would be placed and other times we would bid incrementally so as to not open ourselves up to being shill bid, as ironic as that might sound. In each instance our bids were made with the intent to buy back the item and a willingness to pay the buyer’s premium, as we did each time we bought back a lot"

Are you saying you placed a card(s) in an auction and placed a top all bid on that lot so you would win the auction no matter what? What possible purpose does that serve? You lose out on the buyer and/or seller commission and have to pay for the lot?

On another note, I would also suggest "protecting" a lot would be the same as "shilling" a lot. It may have been common practice, but it was unscrupulous.

Auctions have an inherent amount of risk associated with them, protecting or shilling lots removes some of that risk but at the expense of creating artificial, public prices (as mentioned by several other previous posters).

Rob G$theil

Does anyone think there is a possibility that the Fed's may look into bidding practices/records of current auction houses, that are run by people who are listed as shill bidders?

I'm stunned by some of the names on the list, to say the least.

Tony

What a shame.

As someone who prefers business be left to it's own as much as possible, these auction businesses show the need for regulation/enforcement/oversight...at least more so than has been in the past

Quote:

Originally Posted by MattyC (Post 1496922)

Is Forman the same one from SGC? And can anyone see if those shilled lots were SGC cards?

Has this been answered? It's a long thread so I may have missed it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bunst (Post 1497180)

Has this been answered? It's a long thread so I may have missed it.

Yes, Dave Forman is the owner of SGC, he may also be President but I am not sure. He and his brother Steve are identified on the list in several places.

ADDED I have not looked up the lots so I don't know the answer to the second part of your question.