Nick Furious

He's probably just one part of a Brotherhood of Evil Comic Book Profiteers who have banded together for this CGC takedown. He's the one who gets made fun of by the other members of the Brotherhood.

What became of all the existing inventory when the micro-trimmer was finally caught and outed? A lot of trimming suspicion in some of the books posted here.

Right now, he is just the scammer. The loser part will only come from bringing him to accountability. It's really on CGC to make sure he comes out the loser.

Pic #4 looks like maybe an attempt to get offers outside of the Ebay platform?

Are you able to post some pictures? At the moment everyone here has less information about their value than you do. Does being in binders mean that they have holes punched in them? If so, that may pretty much kill the value.

I agree, and for this very reason I think that CGC completely owns every bit of this until they name names. The full extent of the perp's activities deserves scrutiny. If CGC doesn't facilitate that by naming him, I will then assume that there is something bigger being kept under wraps.

I don't believe there are a bunch of fraudulent books out there that were just switched by the perp and didn't go through CGC reholdering, I haven't seen any evidence of that and I think it's just a guess. However, I don't think that this is a situation where a lack of evidence equals evidence to the contrary. If the CPR were done through CGC, the owner of the blue label with missing MVS probably would have been quietly compensated. If it were done outside of CGC, they would have been told to pound sand and there would be no proof of their claim other than the word of them and the presser.

Ease up on the Straw-Man arguments. Where did "going to zero" come from? There's a lot of space between "falling in value" and "going to zero". The legitimate question is; will there be some impact on values...or zero impact on values?

Tell the buyer that you have morals and standards, and you won't commit slab-fraud for anything less than $200.

I agree, that is also a reason for the laundering. But I also am not convinced that a switcheroo slab doesn't leave evidence of tampering for those who have reason to look for it.

If you ignore the trolls, they start to feel stupid eventually. Unless they are too stupid to feel stupid. That's always a possibility, apparently.

I've been wondering about this potentially unnecessary step as well since someone brought it up. For something like the MJ insert, the answer is obvious. But for switching a green label to blue or 9.4 to 9.8, it must have something to do with the condition of the case. I figure that if the book grade was somewhat suspect to a buyer, the case needed to be pristine. A loosely graded book inside a less-than-pristine case might be too many red flags to someone who just spent thousands of dollars. So, the damaged cases were laundered through CGC to remove the evidence of tampering. That's my theory.

Curious what was the dollar amount of the sale. Was it a big enough amount to raise the caution flags for a buyer?

When I re-holder I just request a holder and label be sent to me and I put it together myself. Saves everyone a bunch of time and money.

Word Salad. Never a good sign of innocence.

I think that would be a good move as well. As for the label-only thing, I've seen books for sale that had the CGC label but were no longer in a slab. I think we could see more of this as fallout from this situation. It gives buyers an opportunity to inspect the interior of the book while purchasing. I think CGC should support this with an offer to regrade those books if they are sent in with the label, say at $50, regardless of value. No guarantee on the grade of course but an opportunity to get a $3,000 Hulk 181 back into a slab for $50.

My Predictions: 1) CGC will not need to design a new slab to restore confidence in new submissions going forward. There are easier ways to give a buyer an opportunity to verify that the correct book is in the slab. 2) CGC will offer a discounted fixed price to re-grade high-dollar books sent in with the CGC label. Will not have to be in the slab. Allowing owners to crack them out and inspect them before selling or re-grading them. 3) CGC will work with law enforcement to make an example of this submitter as a cautionary tale to would-be scammers.

That's pretty impressive.

@mlovestyou might want to consider getting a table at @TerrysComics CalComiccon Comic Swap. I think the price is in the $150 range and you can take a decent representative sample of the collection you are looking to sell. You can sell at the Comic Swap but more importantly, you probably would make contacts there with folks who would be interested in buying quantities of books at somewhere between wholesale and full FMV.

I'm going to buy only purple and green label books until Jay-Z comes on this thread to break it all down and outline the steps going forward.

lol, the irony is thick! Don't you ever get sick of those constant PM complainers?

In hindsight, none of the books, either the originals or the substitutions, should have been purchased online by the perpetrator. But working only with "locally sourced material" would have severely limited the inventory and the scope of the operation.

I would prefer they use him for my books. But not for the rest of you.

Folks here have trained their eyes to spot 9.2's in 9.8 labels.