Kudos to LOTG - discovered counterfeit #311 1952 Mantle PSA 1 in latest auction

[bobbyw8469]

Originally Posted by Al C.risafulli

I figure I'll get out in front of this one.

Indeed, we had in our auction a display piece that included a '52 Mantle in a PSA holder with an authentic certification number.

On auction closing weekend I had a bidder ask a question about the piece, which led me to take a harder look at the card. Ultimately on Monday morning I sent an email to PSA to ask them if they'd kindly take a look at the card for me, and then I sent the entire display piece to them by FedEx.

I sent an email to Micah, advising him of the situation and asking him not to pay his invoice until I received a final word from PSA.

Wednesday night, I received the email from PSA that the card was, indeed, counterfeit. The fraudsters (not my consignor, but the person from whom he bought the display piece years ago) seem to have cracked an authentic Mantle out, inserted a fake, and then put the entire holder into what looked like a very nice framed display. Behind a sheet of glass and then the plastic holder, it was pretty convincing. Thankfully, we caught it before money exchanged hands, but offered Micah an account credit for the inconvenience.

Unfortunate for Micah, who felt he'd gotten a good price on a card, but very fortunate for Micah, who didn't wind up paying nearly $6K for a counterfeit.

-Al

Kudos...what gave it away....was the case frosted Al?

[bobbyw8469]

On 2nd though...just looking at the colors would have raised a red flag with me.....it looks like a bad fake....but I am sure the case was frosted as well.

[Peter_Spaeth]

..

[Jobu]

I was the tipster. Several things about the card looked wrong to me so I reached out to Al hoping a) that I was wrong and b) to help him avoid a mess by sending it out/paying the consignor if I was right.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Jobu

I was the tipster. Several things about the card looked wrong to me so I reached out to Al hoping a) that I was wrong and b) to help him avoid a mess by sending it out/paying the consignor if I was right.

Does anything about it look right?

[robkas68]

Good story. And nothing about that Mantle looks right. With respect to the missing pixel, my own Mantle doesn't "appear" to be missing the pixel. That's because whoever decided to "fix" mine decided it would look better if the missing pixel was colored in.

[pokerplyr80]

Peter is that really the card in question? That looks terrible. Al did anyone look at the card before putting it in the auction? Did it look that bad in person?

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by pokerplyr80

Peter is that really the card in question? That looks terrible. Al did anyone look at the card before putting it in the auction? Did it look that bad in person?

Jesse, that scan is from the auction.