Card doctoring video

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

No crime in that case, there is no concealment. It's the concealment of a material fact (the alteration) that makes it a potential crime.

How do you determine whether a fact is material or not though? And material to what? Material to the value of the item in question? I think this is where the two camps diverge. We have one camp (generally the long-time purist-leaning collectors) who say that an alteration that cannot be detected devalues a card, despite there being no evidence of it on the card itself, and then we have the other camp (generally the younger and more carefree collectors) who say that there is no devaluation of the card because "what difference does it make if something has been altered when that alteration is undetectable?"

We are all free to decide which camp we belong to, but only one of these two camps is right with respect to whether or not a card has lost value. Either the card has indeed been devalued, or it hasn't. And what ultimately determines the value of a card is the open market. And the market bases its values on what can be observed. PSA doesn't care what story you attach to a card. Sticky notes reading "my grandpa said he pulled this card straight from the pack and kept it in a book untouched and unaltered for 67 years" and "the guy I bought this from said it was trimmed" both hold no weight at all in their determination of the card, and the market has clearly decided that it relies on PSA/SGCs decisions to determine value.

If the card hasn't actually lost any value on the open market, then whatever has been done to the card couldn't possibly be a material fact with respect to its valuation when sold.

I think you have zero chance of getting a jury to convict someone based on your arguments.

Try this... Go explain the trimming scandal to your non-collector friends. Tell them about how some hobbyists will buy cards that are oversized, then trim them down to the correct size in a way that is undetectable, then submit them for grading, then resell them on the open market and ask those non-hobby friends if they think that's a crime. They will all laugh at you. I asked about 20 people a few years back when this first came up because I was trying to get people to bet against me on the outcome of the FBI investigation. I wanted to see how a potential jury of non collectors might view the situation. Every single one of them said it wasn't a crime, and several even said things like, "sounds smart to me" or just laughed at the situation or rolled their eyes at what they saw as old men yelling at clouds. Zero people saw it as fraud.

[G1911]

Damage to a collectible is relevant to value. Value usually goes down with damage. Missing pieces of a card is very, very obviously damage.

If alteration is not relevant to value or sales, if it does not affect prices, then 1) we wouldn't have a big majority of hobbyists thinking it relevant and 2) the pro-fraud wing of the hobby would not need to cover up their trimming; they could freely disclose it to no negative impact. Why don't they? Because it's bad and harms value. This shit isn't difficult. If you need to cover it up, it's material. If it's material, it needs to be disclosed whether it is a car, a baseball card, or anything else.

Personally, I don't really care if a card I buy is micro trimmed. It's slotted into my set and I'll enjoy it the same. But it's obviously material and if I covered up trimming when selling a card, I'd be committing fraud by hiding and not disclosing relevant information about the item. The world doesn't revolve around my personal narrative and what I like. Just a smidgeon of honesty and common sense goes a long way. If my dumbass can figure this out, I'm sure our resident pro-fraud 'hobbyists' that spend most of their posts explaining how fraud and scamming is fine can figure it out too.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by G1911

Damage to a collectible is relevant to value. Value usually goes down with damage. Missing pieces of a card is very, very obviously damage.

If alteration is not relevant to value or sales, if it does not affect prices, then 1) we wouldn't have a big majority of hobbyists thinking it relevant and 2) the pro-fraud wing of the hobby would not need to cover up their trimming; they could freely disclose it to no negative impact. Why don't they? Because it's bad and harms value. This shit isn't difficult. If you need to cover it up, it's material. If it's material, it needs to be disclosed whether it is a car, a baseball card, or anything else.

Personally, I don't really care if a card I buy is micro trimmed. It's slotted into my set and I'll enjoy it the same. But it's obviously material and if I covered up trimming when selling a card, I'd be committing fraud by hiding and not disclosing relevant information about the item. The world doesn't revolve around my personal narrative and what I like. Just a smidgeon of honesty and common sense goes a long way. If my dumbass can figure this out, I'm sure our resident pro-fraud 'hobbyists' that spend most of their posts explaining how fraud and scamming is fine can figure it out too.

The lengths to which people will go to deny what is self-evident, and/or to deny incontrovertible facts such as that the Wagner was part of the Mastro case if a small one, are astounding. And even more astounding is how people will double down in the face of being presented with self-evident points, and facts.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

The lengths to which people will go to deny what is self-evident, and/or to deny incontrovertible facts such as that the Wagner was part of the Mastro case if a small one, are astounding. And even more astounding is how people will double down in the face of being presented with self-evident points, and facts.

Now I ain't no fancy pants lawyer or nothin', but I'm pretty sure that just because you are admitting it in your plea bargain and take culpability and responsibility for an action even though the statute of limitations on it has expired, it doesn't mean that action was illegal. People just, like, cop to things that aren't illegal in their plea deals all the time just because.

We all have opinions, what is is not necessarily what should be, but what is is the realm of actual, verifiable and ascertainable fact. It amazes me how many people will insist X or Y is or is not in a document that they are unable or unwilling to read. No one has ever won an argument by virtue of their illiteracy. I expect a small number of hobbyists to openly support fraud and a much larger number to quietly and tacitly support fraud that benefits them and their buddies, but I would hope that these people would be able to avoid the stupid trap of insisting and doubling down on provably false claims to fact. Clearly they are too fucking dumb to do even that.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by G1911

Now I ain't no fancy pants lawyer or nothin', but I'm pretty sure that just because you are admitting it in your plea bargain and take culpability and responsibility for an action even though the statute of limitations on it has expired, it doesn't mean that action was illegal. People just, like, cop to things that aren't illegal in their plea deals all the time just because.

We all have opinions, what is is not necessarily what should be, but what is is the realm of actual, verifiable and ascertainable fact. It amazes me how many people will insist X or Y is or is not in a document that they are unable or unwilling to read. No one has ever won an argument by virtue of their illiteracy. I expect a small number of hobbyists to openly support fraud and a much larger number to quietly and tacitly support fraud that benefits them and their buddies, but I would hope that these people would be able to avoid the stupid trap of insisting and doubling down on provably false claims to fact. Clearly they are too fucking dumb to do even that.

To those who think selling trimmed cards without disclosure could never be viewed as a crime, the Mastro case is very inconvenient proof to the contrary. As is the FBI investigation of PWCC et al, even if ultimately charges were not brought. If there was no possible crime, nobody, least of all Brian Brusokas, would have devoted the enormous effort to investigating. Not that such proof is even needed, as it's very clear from the face of the mail and wire fraud statutes, which are always being applied to new situations.

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

To those who think selling trimmed cards without disclosure could never be viewed as a crime, the Mastro case is very inconvenient proof to the contrary. As is the FBI investigation of PWCC et al, even if ultimately charges were not brought. If there was no possible crime, nobody, least of all Brian Brusokas, would have devoted the enormous effort to investigating. Not that such proof is even needed, as it's very clear from the face of the mail and wire fraud statutes, which are always being applied to new situations.

It feels like you're spinning the facts here to fit your narrative though. Mastro was charged with shill bidding and ONE count of mail fraud, which was for the counterfeit baseball he sold and shipped through Mastro auctions. The mail fraud charge was also shared by other Mastro Auctions employees who had nothing to do with the Wagner. He didn't even mail the card at all. He sold it to someone in person as a cash deal in 1987.

I'm no lawyer, but when I read through discussions of this topic on the Blowhard forums a few years back, I seem to recall most of the lawyers there were in agreement that he had not in fact been charged with any crimes in relation to the Wagner card. But rather it was brought up during the trial as a mere testimony to his character, or lack thereof. Him basically just trying to come clean with anything and everything he could in an effort to gain favor and get a more lenient sentence. But he was not directly charged with a crime for anything related to the Wagner. You mention that he admitted to trimming the Wagner in his plea deal, but that plea deal was rejected by the judge. He was not sentenced for anything to do with the Wagner.

[parkplace33]

Originally Posted by Snowman

It feels like you're spinning the facts here to fit your narrative though. Mastro was charged with shill bidding and ONE count of mail fraud, which was for the counterfeit baseball he sold and shipped through Mastro auctions. The mail fraud charge was also shared by other Mastro Auctions employees who had nothing to do with the Wagner. He didn't even mail the card at all. He sold it to someone in person as a cash deal in 1987.

I'm no lawyer, but when I read through discussions of this topic on the Blowhard forums a few years back, I seem to recall most of the lawyers there were in agreement that he had not in fact been charged with any crimes in relation to the Wagner card. But rather it was brought up during the trial as a mere testimony to his character, or lack thereof. Him basically just trying to come clean with anything and everything he could in an effort to gain favor and get a more lenient sentence. But he was not directly charged with a crime for anything related to the Wagner. You mention that he admitted to trimming the Wagner in his plea deal, but that plea deal was rejected by the judge. He was not sentenced for anything to do with the Wagner.

Thanks Travis, well said. You won’t change any minds here though.

And it’s funny how there was no response to this question posted earlier:

But my question for you is this… if there was no shill bidding and just the trimming, does this case still result in a plea deal?

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Snowman

It feels like you're spinning the facts here to fit your narrative though. Mastro was charged with shill bidding and ONE count of mail fraud, which was for the counterfeit baseball he sold and shipped through Mastro auctions. The mail fraud charge was also shared by other Mastro Auctions employees who had nothing to do with the Wagner. He didn't even mail the card at all. He sold it to someone in person as a cash deal in 1987.

I'm no lawyer, but when I read through discussions of this topic on the Blowhard forums a few years back, I seem to recall most of the lawyers there were in agreement that he had not in fact been charged with any crimes in relation to the Wagner card. But rather it was brought up during the trial as a mere testimony to his character, or lack thereof. Him basically just trying to come clean with anything and everything he could in an effort to gain favor and get a more lenient sentence. But he was not directly charged with a crime for anything related to the Wagner. You mention that he admitted to trimming the Wagner in his plea deal, but that plea deal was rejected by the judge. He was not sentenced for anything to do with the Wagner.

It's in the indictment itself. It wasn't "brought up during the trial." But don't let the facts get in the way, OK? I agree fully with people who are saying it's not the focus of the case. it was not. I only brought it up at all in response to the demonstrably false claim that selling an altered card without disclosure could not possibly be viewed as a crime. And again, speaking of questions nobody is answering, someone please explain why, if selling altered cards without disclosure could never be a crime, why the FBI undertook a several year investigation into card doctoring.

[Johnny630]

Originally Posted by Snowman

How do you determine whether a fact is material or not though? And material to what? Material to the value of the item in question? I think this is where the two camps diverge. We have one camp (generally the long-time purist-leaning collectors) who say that an alteration that cannot be detected devalues a card, despite there being no evidence of it on the card itself, and then we have the other camp (generally the younger and more carefree collectors) who say that there is no devaluation of the card because "what difference does it make if something has been altered when that alteration is undetectable?"

We are all free to decide which camp we belong to, but only one of these two camps is right with respect to whether or not a card has lost value. Either the card has indeed been devalued, or it hasn't. And what ultimately determines the value of a card is the open market. And the market bases its values on what can be observed. PSA doesn't care what story you attach to a card. Sticky notes reading "my grandpa said he pulled this card straight from the pack and kept it in a book untouched and unaltered for 67 years" and "the guy I bought this from said it was trimmed" both hold no weight at all in their determination of the card, and the market has clearly decided that it relies on PSA/SGCs decisions to determine value.

If the card hasn't actually lost any value on the open market, then whatever has been done to the card couldn't possibly be a material fact with respect to its valuation when sold.

I think you have zero chance of getting a jury to convict someone based on your arguments.

Try this... Go explain the trimming scandal to your non-collector friends. Tell them about how some hobbyists will buy cards that are oversized, then trim them down to the correct size in a way that is undetectable, then submit them for grading, then resell them on the open market and ask those non-hobby friends if they think that's a crime. They will all laugh at you. I asked about 20 people a few years back when this first came up because I was trying to get people to bet against me on the outcome of the FBI investigation. I wanted to see how a potential jury of non collectors might view the situation. Every single one of them said it wasn't a crime, and several even said things like, "sounds smart to me" or just laughed at the situation or rolled their eyes at what they saw as old men yelling at clouds. Zero people saw it as fraud.

Travis, it’s conceivable to me that Mastro could have gotten squeezed into bringing up what he did to the Wagner it adds to the allure of the whole luster of the government's case I believe his Partner Rob L snitched/cooperated with government against him…headline Major Auction House man not only manipulated auction sales for millions he altered the most prolific and expensive baseball card in hobby history.

I still believe that his admission into trimming the Wagner had some bearing on his conviction, do to concealment, just not nearly as much weight as the shill bidding price manipulation scheme/fraud.’