Watch Your Sixes, There Are Thieves Out There
This week a rant on the crooks out there.
Two incidents at the Anaheim Show over Labor Day Weekend stand out for me as cautionary tales. Let’s dish.
One of the great parts of being a dealer at a show is the walk-in. A good one can make your entire show for you. A bad one can cost you your entire profit. The latter was nearly the fate of a friend of mine. He bought a 1963 Topps high grade Pete Rose RC in a PSA holder, and showed it to me. I took a quick look, and something seemed off. On closer inspection, the card looked wrong, too fuzzy, and muddy. I busted out the 30x loupe and 100x microscope I bring with me to shows and confirmed my suspicion. It turns out we had a scumbag walking the show selling fake high value PSA graded cards. The Rose was bogus, and the PSA slab was resealed with glue. It wasn’t a great fake, but it didn’t have to be, because my friend was busy with customers and trusted the PSA slab rather than inspecting the card carefully. My friend was very lucky that day. He went off in search of the fraudster, found him, and got a refund.
As an aside, one thing I’ve learned over 30+ years of professional fraud hunting as a plaintiff’s attorney is that the professional ones never fight when they get caught, they just settle up. They know that one pissed off customer moving against them civilly and criminally will cost them far more than a refund.
Another tale, flip side, sort of, is the wake of being taken advantage of by a fraudster. As I mentioned before, a guy came to my table with a box that had an easy $50K of cards in it, except that nearly all of them were trimmed and encapsulated as such. He wanted a big percentage of market for them and while he said that he bought them knowingly, you could just tell he was lying. At least I could. He probably didn’t realize it, but I remember him as a dealer years before when he bought some of the same cards, sent them in, and discovered that he’d been taken.
Picking up bad cards isn’t unusual, unfortunately, in this thing of ours. I’ve had lots of people bring me trimmed cards for purchase. Most of them were just mistakes that they were trying to unload. Dishonest but understandable. I buy and sell raw cards, so I get how it can happen.
The third-party graders make it so much worse. I recently sent CGC a blatantly trimmed N310 Mayo card. I knew I was trimmed; even a blind bat could have sonared out that hack job. Yet for some reason the card came back with a numerical grade. I can’t sell it unless I state my opinion that it is trimmed. Here’s the crazy thing, though: disclosing the trim sometimes doesn’t do any real damage. There are some people who simply will not believe the facts even when they are hit over the head with them. I once offered an N184 for sale on eBay. In my opinion, the card was trimmed (it had no right border at all) and I sold it with that statement. I could not say for sure that it had been trimmed because I did not see the work done, but the card certainly looked trimmed to me. Honest seller, right? Boy, did I get hate mail. One collector angrily wrote that I should just measure the card and that would tell me if it was trimmed. No, it won’t. Cutting methods 130 years ago were variable in outcome. The fact that I saw no border on one side and a normal border on the other side told me it was most likely trimmed, but saying so really triggered this guy for some reason, maybe a bad circumcision?
Then there are the common thieves. Per PCL historian and collector (and all around good guy) Mark Macrae:
“I'm sending this out on behalf of Sal Dichiera. Many of you have met Sal at the National Convention. He has only missed a few in 40 years. His car was broken into on Saturday during tear down at the Long Beach Coin /Collectibles show. Some of these items are quite unique, particularly the California League & Pacific Coast League items.. A list of the identified stolen items is included along with a police report number. Sal's contact info is included. Thanks,
Mark
Sal Dichiera
Amazing Adventures
650-743-1158
orders@amazing-adventures.com
Saturday Afternoon my car was broken into in Long Beach Convention Center
Stolen items
Popular Comics #61 CGc 8.0
Hyper Mystery #1 CGC 2.0
Tales Of Suspense #57 CGC 3.5
Tomb Of Dracula #10 CGC 6.5
Amazing Spiderman #121 CGC 7.5
Amazing Spiderman #122 CGC 6.5
Strange Tales #97 CGC 6.0
Eerie #11 Avon 1953 CGC 5.5
Tales To Astonish #3 CGC 5.5
Demon #1 CGC 9.4
Strange Worlds #1 Atlas CGC 6.5
X-Men #145 CGC 9.8
Amazing Spiderman #1 Golden Record Reprint CGC 9.2
Fantastic Four #51 CGC 6.5
Four Color #108 CGC 8.5
Mad Comics #2 CGC 8.0
Mad Comics #22 CGC 8.5
Amazing Spiderman #32 CGC 6.5
Mad Comics #18 CGC 6.5
Mad Comics #17 CGC 7.0
Mad Comics #12 CGC 6.0
Mad Comics #20 CGC 6.0
Air Pirates #1 CGC 9.2
Air Pirates #2 CGC 9.6
Mad Comics #23 CGC 7.5
Ebon #1 CGC 9.4
Superman # 59 CGC 7.0
Ungraded- Black Cat #1 Very Fine, 2 other black cats
3 Planet comics
Air Pirates #1 And #2 ungraded
Strange Tales #178
Marvel Premiere #3
Captain Marvel (golden age) 25, 33. 35, 42
Whiz 60, 64
True Life Secrets #23 Multiple copies
1966 Donruss Marvel Superheroes Full Set Plus many singles
Partial Mars Attack Set
1920-1930 USC Tickets mostly full
1910-1950's Boxing tickets Many Full
Boxing Cards 1910's-1950's
300+ Photos with mostly Brooklyn Dodgers, and World Series 1920-1950's
1953 Hunter Wieners 3 SCG Graded
1929-30 Roger Peet Cards
1952, 1953 Mother Cookies around 100
1960 Darigold Spokane Indians 10+
1916, 1924 , 1928 Rose Bowl Plus more
1920-1930's USC Football Programs
1950-1960's Dodger Programs and Yearbooks
Rams Programs
Angels Programs
1890's-1930's baseball programs
Montreal Royals Material
1948 Angel Team cards
1950 Hollywood Star Team Cards
1947 Centennial Seattle Rainiers Cards 20+
1952 Mother Cookies Fred Haney Schedule Back
1911 T-217 Mono 3
Zeenuts 25+
1951 New York Giants full tickets 15+
1948 Leaf Football Cards
1950 Bowman Football Cards
1951 Bowman Football Cards
1955 Topps All American Cards
1919 Sketchbook Cubs And White Sox
Hage cards
1909-12 Los Angels team photo pinback
1932 and 1933 Wheaties Minneapolis Millers 20+
2 Alexander Cartwright Documents, one signed
T-4 Obaks Sutor, Vitt, Sheenan Christian
1911 D-310 PC Biscuit Raleigh PSA 4.5
1911 D-311 PC Biscuit McDonnell PSA 5
1911 D-310 PC Biscuit 6 SCG 4.0
1930 Bobby Jones Postcard SCG 5.0
1889 California Leagues Cabinets 2
Upper Deck Michael Jordan Signed Basketball
1950's Nellie Fox Mighty Mites Button
1951 Bowman Baseball Set NO Mantle Or Mays. 1952 Bowman Baseball Set
Complete,1953 Bowman Baseball Set Complete,1954 Bowman Baseball Set Complete
1952 Topps Baseball 1-310,1956 Topps Basebal Set l Complete.1959
Topps Baseball Set Complete ,1960 Topps Baseball Set Complete
1954 Bowman Football Set Complete,1955 Bowman Football Set
Complete.1955 Topps All American Set Complete,1956 Topps Football Set
Complete,1958 Topps Football Set complete,1959 Topps Football Set
Box Of 1950-1970's Baseball And football very Clean, Highlites, 1953
topps Jackie Robinson, 1954 Topps Hank Aaron, 1956 Topps Mantle
1957 Signed Johnny Unitas certified, 1957 Signed Bart Starr
certified, 1957 Signed Paul Hornung certified
1962 Topps Mars Attack Set 53/55 cards, 1950' Topps World On Wheels
High Numbers
Long Beach Police Report 23-44642, Officer Ramos 562-760-9472”
I’ve dealt with Sal for decades, starting when I used to visit his store in San Francisco while I was in law school, so I am adding this notice to my screed. If you see any of the cards on this list and have concerns, please pick up the phone to the police.
You don’t have to go to a show to be victimized by a card doctor. This week a friend of mine discovered that he is the victim of a card doctor who got his work through PSA and into the PWCC garbage mill. His PSA 8.5 1954 Topps Willie Mays, at the very least recolored to remove a print flaw, maybe had the edges worked on too, and is rightfully an A grade at best. The financial loss is staggering, but perhaps worse for him is that one of the centerpieces of his collection is tainted. All I can say is that if you are considering an expensive postwar slabbed card, check its provenance. Look up the cert number, check to see who sold it, try to run down who bought it, and so on.
Sorry to be a crime reporter this morning, but the money is attracting the flies and the information needs to be out there. But I did have some card-related fun, too. I always say that if the per-unit cost is right, I will buy any card or sports memorabilia and make money, and I had the opportunity to put my money where my mouth is last week. I acquired a massive NASCAR collection of postcards and premiums (and a few cards too). Since then, I’ve been doing a deep dive into NASCAR collectibles, and I will start turning out the collection in October via eBay (if you want something specific, drop me a note and we can make a deal). The research has been fascinating and I will try and get it published. Two things surprised me so far. First, I think of NASCAR as a southern sport but California has a long history of racing stock cars, and a pretty good number of top-tier NASCAR drivers in the early days (1948-1970) were Californians. Second is that Bubba Wallace was not the first black driver. That would be Wendell Scott, who started in the Jim Crow era, overcame insane hardships, racial barriers at some tracks, death threats, and even a poisoning incident, and was the first black man to win a NASCAR Cup Series race. He was elected to the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2015. I also picked up one of the worst beaters I have ever bought and was happy to get it. 1960 Master Vending Pele. The set is a ridiculously rare Italian set that was printed in the UK and just does not exist. The PSA pop on Pele cards is 6. Ever. Now, that’s my kind of card. Rare as heck in any condition. The card doctors can bite me.
Back at you next time with an article for the “i” word people out there.