Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by OhioLawyerF5

That would go over well at trial as I parade so many sportscards experts and collectors to the stand that the judge has to cut it off. Juries find it very powerful when a judge has to say, "Ok, we get it, no need for more testimony."

Yep. And then I'll call more with the complete opposite opinion as you. Including countless graders at PSA and SGC. Even the former owner of SGC openly cleaned cards. The MAJORITY of collectors in this hobby see nothing wrong with it. That's a problem for you and your argument. And despite what fantasy world you think you live in, once you step outside of the hobby, you will find almost zero people who would view cleaning and reselling a sports card as evenly remotely fraudulent. I'll call PSA graders to the stand and ask them if it's OK to remove wax off an 86 Fleer Basketball card and then you're going to have a real hard time convincing a jury that while it's OK to clean wax off an 86 Fleer Basketball card that it's actually not OK to wipe it off of a 72 Topps Baseball card because "just trust me bro". Or that while it's OK to soak cards A, B, and C in water to remove the glue and scrapbook paper from the backs that it's actually not OK to soak cards D, E, and F in water because "that's just how it is and that's just how I want my hobby to be god dammit!". You're going to come across to any jury as a hypocritical old man screaming at clouds attempting to apply double-standards to a hobby that has blinded your ability to see the world through the lens of any normal rational human being.

Taking a thing and cleaning the thing so that it presents nicer is not fraud. Nor is it an alteration. If a bird poops on your car, you don't have to attach a letter to the bill of sale for having cleaned it off. And if you get a piece of gunk on a baseball card, you don't have to attach a letter to it either for having removed said gunk from the card just because some delusional nutjob collector (or even an army of them) wishes the world worked that way because "god dammit! I don't want any cards that used to have gunk on them in my collection!!!"

It's not fraud and you're a dumbass for thinking it is.