PWCC Statement on Recent Card Trimming Concerns

[Peter_Spaeth]

Same concept IMO and well reasoned. Only difference is that here it's done over and over and over and over again and involves use of the mail and wires.

[vintagetoppsguy]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Same concept IMO and well reasoned. Only difference is that here it's done over and over and over and over again and involves use of the mail and wires.

Glad that you agree with that analogy. I like it too. So, let's build on that. Let's say the person that rolled back the odometer (we'll assume it's the owner of the car) runs the car through an auto auction. We'll call the owner of the car Moser and we'll call the auction company Brent's Auto Auction. Is the auction company legally responsible for the misrepresented car?

I already know the answer. I have a lot of experience auctioning pre-owned vehicles. I did this for many years. My old eBay username is pre-ownedautos. I was offered a lot of money for the sale of that ID. I declined. So, let's hear your answer.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by vintagetoppsguy

Glad that you agree with that analogy. I like it too. So, let's build on that. Let's say the person that rolled back the odometer (we'll assume it's the owner of the car) runs the car through an auto auction. We'll call the owner of the car Moser and we'll call the auction company Brent's Auto Auction. Is the auction company legally responsible for the misrepresented car?

I already know the answer. I have a lot of experience auctioning pre-owned vehicles. I did this for many years. My old eBay username is pre-ownedautos. I was offered a lot of money for the sale of that ID. I declined. So, let's hear your answer.

Does the auction company have a 15 year relationship with the owner where it has been knowingly participating in the fraud for 100s or 1000s of vehicles, and in each case has seen the odometer before it got rolled back?

[vintagetoppsguy]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Does the auction company have a 15 year relationship with the owner where it has been knowingly participating in the fraud for 100s or 1000s of vehicles, and in each case has seen the odometer before it got rolled back?

Edited. Misread your question.

The owner has a 15 year relationship with the consignor selling multiple vehicles for him over the years. He knew the consignor had a criminal past, served some prison time, was just a shady guy in general, but didn't know about the odometer roll back even though he suspected it.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by vintagetoppsguy

Edited. Misread your question.

The owner has a 15 year relationship with the consignor selling multiple vehicles for him over the years. He knew the consignor had a criminal past, served some prison time, was just a shady guy in general, but didn't know about the odometer roll back even though he suspected it.

Then I object to the analogy as completely inaccurate. Brent saw the before and after cards, remember? He auctioned both. He sold cards in one grade to Moser and received them back from PSA or him in higher grades. 100s or 1000s of times. Among massive other evidence.

[vintagetoppsguy]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Brent saw the before and after cards, remember?

Do you think Brent personally looks at each and every card that PWCC consigns? Really? Who knew it was a one man operation.? Gee, I always figured he had workers that did that kind of stuff for him - receiving consignments, scanning, creating listings, shipping, etc.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by vintagetoppsguy

Do you think Brent personally looks at each and every card that PWCC consigns? Really? Who knew it was a one man operation.? Gee, I always figured he had workers that did that kind of stuff for him - receiving consignments, scanning, creating listings, shipping, etc.

He SAYS he does, over a certain dollar value, personally, to assign stickers. It's posted several places but I've lost track of what's where. Anyhow 1000s of cards over 15 years (for much of which he was a one man operation), yeah he knows the score. And he has admitted it, to me and others.

[bounce]

Originally Posted by vintagetoppsguy

Edited. Misread your question.

The owner has a 15 year relationship with the consignor selling multiple vehicles for him over the years. He knew the consignor had a criminal past, served some prison time, was just a shady guy in general, but didn't know about the odometer roll back even though he suspected it.

Peter - is there not also a "had reason to know and/or should have known" component if you're a seller? Doesn't make you the criminal, but does give you the liability for loss?

As you note, though, they sold them once, got them back and sold them again. The question of criminality of this will certainly be influenced by who sent them in.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by bounce

Peter - is there not also a "had reason to know and/or should have known" component if you're a seller? Doesn't make you the criminal, but does give you the liability for loss?

As you note, though, they sold them once, got them back and sold them again. The question of criminality of this will certainly be influenced by who sent them in.

That surely can be a basis for civil fraud liability. I really don't know in the context of mail and wire fraud, I doubt it but I would defer on that.

[brianp-beme]

My ebay ID is used-cards. So far no one has offered me any money for my ID, but because of this quagmire and now the auto analogy, maybe there is a windfall for me in the future

Brian

[Snapolit1]

I had a high end card last year that I wanted to cross over to PSA. It was a SGC 30. PSA put it in a holder and marked it PSA 4.5.

Have I committed mail fraud if I don't disclose to to my buyer that the other leading card grading company offered me their professional opinion that the card is of a significantly lower quality than PSA?

[perezfan]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

I had a high end card last year that I wanted to cross over to PSA. It was a SGC 30. PSA put it in a holder and marked it PSA 4.5.

Have I committed mail fraud if I don't disclose to to my buyer that the other leading card grading company offered me their professional opinion that the card is of a significantly lower quality than PSA?

A. There is no mention of intentional alteration in your scenario

B. Thus, it is not an "apples to apples" comparison. All it accomplishes is to further demonstrate PSA's ineptitude.

[Griffins]

Originally Posted by perezfan

A. There is no mention of intentional alteration in your scenario

B. Thus, it is not an "apples to apples" comparison. All it accomplishes is to further demonstrate PSA's ineptitude.

Or it could show PSA has a different basis for grading. Centering the 2 companies are very different, and I had a bunch of T200's that I crossed and the 2 companies obviously had very different criteria.

To a certain extent I don't expect one companies 6 to be anothers. I do expect one companies 6 to be a 6 every time they grade a similar card.

[Steve D]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

I had a high end card last year that I wanted to cross over to PSA. It was a SGC 30. PSA put it in a holder and marked it PSA 4.5.

Have I committed mail fraud if I don't disclose to to my buyer that the other leading card grading company offered me their professional opinion that the card is of a significantly lower quality than PSA?

Originally Posted by perezfan

A. There is no mention of intentional alteration in your scenario

B. Thus, it is not an "apples to apples" comparison. All it accomplishes is to further demonstrate PSA's ineptitude.

C. The SGC grader was having a bad day, was in a bad mood, and/or, thought he saw something that wasn't there, and graded the card lower than it deserved.

Steve

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

I had a high end card last year that I wanted to cross over to PSA. It was a SGC 30. PSA put it in a holder and marked it PSA 4.5.

Have I committed mail fraud if I don't disclose to to my buyer that the other leading card grading company offered me their professional opinion that the card is of a significantly lower quality than PSA?

We've discussed before whether there is an obligation to disclose grading history. I wouldn't know how to find it. I think generally not unless you are asked and lie, if no alteration involved in the bump, but as I recall there were some good points made on the other side.

[Bram99]

The focus of the scandal for many on this board and the BO board seems to be the card doctors (Moser in particular) and the auction houses (PWCC in particular) that possibly knowingly sold doctored cards.

Of course this is bad behavior and possibly illegal, definitely immoral, and they and their businesses will likely suffer in undetermined ways because of their actions.

But not enough of the focus is on PSA or the third-party graders in general.

We didn't really learn anything new about the tendency of people like the card doctors and their sales fronts in this scandal. Those things have been present in one way or another for years and in fact are part of the reason for the TPG's in the first place - to give the buyer/collector/investor comfort that the card is real, unaltered, and it fits closely to the objective traits of the subjective grade that they provide.

I think a new learning would be (or at least a more solid understanding of how pervasive the condition) how inept or carelessly or willfully negligent the TPG's really are at assigning a grade and detecting alterations including trimming, recoloring, adding back corners, removing stains, removing creases, etc.

So while the particular doctors in this case may be stopped for now, and while one auction house may take a hit, the big impact of the scandals uncovered over the past few months is that our collective faith in third party graders who grade using current methods has been probably irreparably damaged.

The damage to our faith in their expertise will likely cost many who own graded cards some measure of market value of those cards.

The open question is what will come to rectify the problem of TPG's' ineptitude? Because the need is still there.

Because there is a need for uniform opinions of condition rather than the old days of "well high book value X and this card looks pretty good", and because there are many more card doctors hiding in the shadows, the need for a good third-party opinion remains. The question is - who and what will come in to fill that need now that the current TPG's have proved extremely fallable? That should be the trajectory this discussion takes while the market and legal authorities deal with those who have been exposed.

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

I had a high end card last year that I wanted to cross over to PSA. It was a SGC 30. PSA put it in a holder and marked it PSA 4.5.

Have I committed mail fraud if I don't disclose to to my buyer that the other leading card grading company offered me their professional opinion that the card is of a significantly lower quality than PSA?

Assuming you were the person who submitted the card for the crossover, and then subsequently sold it, no. If though you sold/loaned the card to someone else and it was that person who had it crossed over, upon your subsequent sale of the card you probably would have a duty to make the disclosure if (1) the person who crossed it over was a known card doctor or (2) the card looked different to you after it was crossed over.

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by vintagetoppsguy

Glad that you agree with that analogy. I like it too. So, let's build on that. Let's say the person that rolled back the odometer (we'll assume it's the owner of the car) runs the car through an auto auction. We'll call the owner of the car Moser and we'll call the auction company Brent's Auto Auction. Is the auction company legally responsible for the misrepresented car?

I already know the answer. I have a lot of experience auctioning pre-owned vehicles. I did this for many years. My old eBay username is pre-ownedautos. I was offered a lot of money for the sale of that ID. I declined. So, let's hear your answer.

Just want to be certain I have all the facts. In your example, is it the case that Brent's Auto Auction did not at a prior time (1) sell the car to Moser with an odometer reading significantly greater than it now has, or (2) (i) have reason to know Moser's business model was to roll back car odometers or (ii) refer Moser to a company that rolls back odometers and recommend Moser engage their services?

Assuming the answers to these questions are all no, unless there is some statutory law that pertains to automobile auctions that imposes strict liability on the auctioneer that the odometer reading is accurate, I would think the auction company would not be responsible for the misrepresented car.