[BobC]

Originally Posted by Leon

BobC
First of all I am usually wrong at this technical law stuff, it seems.
At first I believed the way you do. Now I don't. I see the pattern of fraud. What more can I say?

As for the Mastro Wagner trimming, according to what I read he went to jail in part, for doing it. It was mail fraud.

This is posted on the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois website, concerning the Wagner. (btw, It is me with the erasers, I love them.)

"The T206-series Wagner card is considered one of the world’s most expensive trading cards. Mastro admitted in the plea agreement that he cut the card’s side borders, and then concealed this information when he sold the card in 1987. Mastro again failed to disclose his alteration even after participating in subsequent auctions of the card in 1991 and 2000. The sale in 2000 produced a purchase price of more than $1 million, according to the plea agreement. Mastro also failed to disclose that he cut the Wagner card again in 1992, even though he was aware that the card had been submitted to become the first baseball card assigned a grade based on the condition of the card."

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I'm with you Leon, you can see the patterns of fraud. I'm also not an attorney, just an accountant, but I've learned and seen over the years how what you think may be a slam dunk isn't necessarily the case when you start pulling out all the facts. Plus, if you try to convict someone criminally you'll need to get a jury of peers, and I doubt if any defense attorney would allow such a jury to get stacked with card collectors who have much knowledge, and opinions, about this. That is where I can see all the vague standards and inconsistent opinions that our hobby has in regards to alterations and restorations can work to benefit card doctors. The TPGs have set themselves up as so-called experts in our hobby, and in so doing, have become integral into the valuation of the little pieces of cardboard we like to collect. But who exactly gave them this designation and power, unfortunately the collecting community did by buying into their claims and services. Initially it was because of the need to get some safety from the "wild west" that used to exist in buying on the internet and not knowing how you may be getting ripped off by an unreputable dealer claiming something was what it was not. I think the original idea was to at least make sure something being purchased online was real, and not so much in such a high grade. That was where/when the "buy the card, not the holder" mantra made its appearance. To his day I still hear some collectors saying to forget about the TPGs givings grades, just guarantee the card is authentic and they can grade it themselves. Then as the idea of the registry started climbing, along with the prices for highly-graded cards taking off, that part of the grading system took over to driving the hobby and has gotten us to where it is now.

I also am aware that Mastro had to allocute to what was done to the Wagner card, but if I remember correctly, that is not the integral charge he got sentenced for, it was the shill bidding. You and I may find it abhorrent that the card was cut from from a strip in modern time and that it was never put into an actual pack of cigarettes and issued back in 1909 or so. But think about this, you have a jury of people who are not knowledgeable collectors and a defense attorney argues and asks that despite the fact the card had been cut from a strip in more recent years, is the card still not in fact an authentic T-206 Wagner card. And the answer is yes. He/she then asks if all the original T-206 cards had not also been printed in sheets and/or strips originally and then been cut from those at one time or another, and again the answer is yes. So he/she then asks, if it is possible that this one Wagner card was cut from such a strip long after the original issuance of these cards in cigarette packs in 1909, how do you know that none of the other ones that exist in the hobby out there today were not also cut from a strip or sheet long after their original issuance in cigarette packs? And if even so, the defense attorney may also argue what difference does it really make then, it is an authentic T-206 Wagner card. He/she could then go on about strip cards and how pretty much all cards are printed in sheets and then cut from them. Over the years people have found and purchased uncut sheets of cards, and likely more than once or twice have cut the cards out hoping to then submit them for high grades to TPGs. Do the TPGs have a way to really catch those and declare them as altered or trimmed? You and I both know the answer to that and if there are possibly any such graded cards out in the hobby today that were likely cut from a sheet long after they were originally to have been issued in packs. But can we prove it, and maybe more importantly, can we also definitively prove which ones in the hobby are or are not cut from sheets after they were supposed to have been???

So if all those technically trimmed cards may be floating around in the hobby, and no one seems to really care because they are authentic, exactly what is wrong with what was done in regards to the T-206 Wagner? Especially when they then ask the current owner to testify what he paid for the card and what he has been offered for it. As a jurist, exactly what harm can you accuse the person who cut that Wagner card from the strip of when the value has increased so much over the years. Exactly who was harmed??? You and I could then testify that because the Wagner card was not issued in a cigarette pack like it should have been over 100 years ago that to a collector/hobby purist its intrinsic value has been diminished, and the defense attorney will ask the stenographer to go back and re-read the testimony of the card's current owner as to what he paid for it and what he has since been offered for it. See the dilemma? There are different people/collectors with many differing thoughts and opinions on what constitutes alterations and what is and is not acceptable.

Until we can get a unified group/organization, independent of the various TPGs and their diverse grading standards and systems, to establish a single, uniform set up grading standards and rules and to force the TPGs to adhere to that unified grading system and subject themselves to outside independent review to assure they are actually performing their grading services in compliance with those standards, we'll always have uncertainty and differences in the collecting community. And because of that, it will always be hard to accuse someone of doing something illegal if there is no set standards or rules to be followed in the first place. And the chances of the TPGs allowing someone else to tell them what to do.................good luck with that!

And I did know you had posted about art gum erasers, and don't disagree with you at all. But there are others that think that is totally wrong and considered altering a card to erase such pencil marks. And just like that difference among collectors in regards to erasing pencil marks, you'll find differences of opinion among collectors about whether or not they have an issue with a card being cut and put in a pack, or if it was later on cut from a sheet or strip. It is still the same card, same paper, same printing ink and process! And if I was a defense attorney, I could also see arguing what is the difference then say in regards to the cards of the Black Swamp find? They were supposed to have been distributed and given out with candy back in the very early 1900's, but instead, some store owner never distributed them and left them in a box in their attic for about 100 years. So someone could argue that they were never issued as they were originally intended to either, but it obviously hasn't had a negative impact on their value. Granted, the ones that have been sold so far were then graded and labeled as part of the Black Swamp find, so I guess that could be construed as giving notice to potential buyers that they were never issued as they should have been. But what about those ones that were not graded and sold? I was under the understanding that not all of the heirs decided to sell their cards and that some asked to have their share of the cards given to them. So if one of them was to later on go to sell one of their cards and not have it graded and marked as part of the Black Swamp find, would they technically be guilty of not having properly disclosed that the card was not issued/distributed properly when it should have been?

And I still guess the biggest issue is whether or not there is actually a written/stated law somewhere that specifically says that selling an altered/trimmed/ restored baseball card is illegal, or that you have to state such when selling it. For now, sellers/dealers have relied upon the TPGs to do the independent grading and authenticating of cards, which the TPGs have claimed an expertise for and that the hobby community has blindly believed and bought into for years. And if the hobby community is shown to almost totally rely solely upon these TPGs for this service (ie: "buy the holder, not the card"), if they grade and authentic a card, then that is apparently what the hobby community is agreeing to as the standard and determining factor of a card's authenticity. So if in that case a TPG looks at a card that does not in their opinion appear to be altered/restored/trimmed, even if it actually may have been altered in some miniscule manner like erasing an errant pencil mark, the hobby community has more or less always gone along with the TPGs opinion and believes that if no alteration/restoration is detectable, then none actually occurred.

Of course then you can start arguing about degrees of alteration. So if you erase a real light pencil mark and no one can tell, some might say that is okay, but removing a crease by manipulating the cardboard in some manner that does not effect the thickness/dimensions of a card, even if you still can't detect the alteration, some might then say that is not. Look at the S-74 silks. They were originally all folded when put into cigarette packs, and the white version ones with the paper advertising still attached to the backs all pretty much came with folds in them. And SGC generally down grades them because of the creases. But is that proper and correct since that is the way they were virtually all distributed in packs? And then what about the very rare few ad-backed silks that don't show any creases? It could reasonably be argued that if there was no crease in the paper backing that the silk was likely never inserted into a pack and that maybe someone working at one of the the factories just took a few home, and that is how some have survived to this day. In that case those were never distributed properly in the same manner as they should have been, so should we downgrade those and consider them as something not as originally issued also. And don't get me started on the colored version silks. They would have also been folded over when put into the cigarette packs, yet you often see them without creases. So is ironing a silk to remove the crease considered an alteration also??? See how nit-picky this can get and you can start splitting hairs as to what is and isn't allowable. And you'll never get everyone to agree on everything 100%.

Thus, without some independent party/body to oversee the hobby and set the standards that everyone ends up following, even if they don't all agree with them 100%, you'll always have trouble going after people for things they do.