Hero Restoration, Anyone know the latest? 28 28

[Nick Furious]

On 1/16/2024 at 3:57 PM, KCOComics said:

That's just it. I've got a pretty big personal collection.  And I can tell you the grade and defining charetoristics of every key and secondary key I have. 

If I had a TOS 57 with a very distinct date stamp in red pen at the top of the book,  how could you forget that? Or mistake it for yours? 

I believe his life is chaos. I don't believe for a second that he's confusing people's books.  

I suspect Mike's personal collection was sold a long time ago.  Back when he still had sincere plans of saving the business.  

[Domo Arigato]

On 1/16/2024 at 10:18 AM, Sauce Dog said:

Don't read too much into me posting suddenly as some big conspiracy.

Where did I say (or even suggest) that your posting created some big conspiracy?

The "bomb" post said that he was selling customer books.....and that one of the books being offered was now off the table because it had to be mailed back to "someone else", and he would offer another one, but to keep in mind it was hot and they need to sit on it for a while.

Then you posted that he was indeed mailing some customers books back to them.

I simply don't think it's a coincidence....that after all this time, he's finally maling some customer books out, and this "bomb" post just happened to verify that.

I'm sure everyone (including me) appreciates all the hard work you've been doing behind the scenes to get customers their books back.  But I, for one, am not going to be swallowing all of the horses**t Mike is dishing out.   He is obviously following this thread.  And I noticed last night that, after his eBay account link was posted in here, he went and changed it.  I just couldn't post about it at the time because the boards were down for several hours.  

I'm also not buying that he's getting these high value books mixed up with his own when listing them for sale.  He has become a master manipulator and excuse maker in order to gain more time for himself. 

 

Edited January 16 by Domo Arigato

[Chip Cataldo]

On 1/16/2024 at 4:57 PM, KCOComics said:

I believe his life is chaos.

I don't believe that for a second. He knows exactly what he's doing every second of every day.

He's stalling for time until he can collect as much cash as possible and then disappear.

[universal soldier]

I'm calling BS on his whole story. Having dealt personally with addiction and living through the lies and hoping, anything he is saying is a load of crapola. It's all part of the addiction cycle of lying, excuses and more lying. Everyone else is to blame. My ex-wife destroyed her family with lie after lie and promise after promise. Eventually we divorced and she drank herself to death. Harsh stark reality of it all. My best friend from high school lost his marriage and relatonship with his kids over alchohol. His bottom was nearly dying and being found by his ex-wife in his own vomit with severe head trauma. He has been sober for nearly 15 years now but is still just a bit off.

I hope I'm wrong and he is one of the amazing recovery stories.

 

On 1/16/2024 at 5:09 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

I don't believe that for a second. He knows exactly what he's doing every second of every day.

He's stalling for time until he can collect as much cash as possible and then disappear.

^ ^  this ^ ^

Edited January 17 by universal soldier

[MatterEaterLad]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:40 PM, mattn792 said:

My favorite line of the latest car added to the excuse train is the “believe a crackhead over a businessman” quip.  Like this guy is an actual businessman.  

Whether you believe Mike or not...

If you want to know what it's like dealing with someone with a meth or heroin addiction, the way Mike is behaving is a textbook example.

The lies, the promises, the excuses, the blaming of others, playing the victim, the depression/euphoria (the sky is falling/it's all good!) the inconsistent behavior, replying at all hours of the night, admitting to an alcohol problem (which is more socially acceptable) as cover for the harder stuff, going to jail, followed by vague excuses for going to jail, all while hanging on to what at this point is stolen property and "mistakingly" putting customer books up for sale on eBay.

I don't think you can believe anything Mike says at this point.

There will always be a grain of truth with some wild spin, some drama that he is helplessly "caught" in.

Mike could come clean, pun intended, with one of these and a witness. But he'd never do it. 

Edited January 16 by MatterEaterLad

[Dr. Balls]

On 1/15/2024 at 5:09 PM, unclezebo said:

It's like 2 trains with loads of burning dumpster fires ran head long into each other. Seems like anytime I thought it couldn't get any worse. HR would say "Hold my beer."

Reminds me of this C&H Sunday strip:

[Buzzetta]

On 1/16/2024 at 5:09 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

I don't believe that for a second. He knows exactly what he's doing every second of every day.

He's stalling for time until he can collect as much cash as possible and then disappear.

 

[Buzzetta]

Right now there is a guy switching comics out of slabs in Kew Gardens / Forest Hills that is breathing a sigh of relief that the CGC Boards have a new focus for the week. 

[KCOComics]

On 1/16/2024 at 5:09 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

I don't believe that for a second. He knows exactly what he's doing every second of every day.

He's stalling for time until he can collect as much cash as possible and then disappear.

I think both things can be true. 

His life is chaos, but it's self created chaos.

And he is intentionally and deliberately stealing from people, selling their books and trying to buy time. 

To go a step further,  I don't believe anything he said about health problems. Covid,  a stroke.  Maybe those things happened,  but they weren't debilitating enough to stop him from drinking, possibly using drugs,  selling books online and opening a store front. 

He is a liar, a thief and deserves 0 empathy. No one should give him the benefit of the doubt on any excuse. 

He has lost all credibility. 

[Domo Arigato]

On 1/16/2024 at 1:43 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

Interesting that the Amazing Fantasy #15 he sold has just "AF 15" as the title. Almost like it was pre-arranged where someone would look for that exact listing and it wasn't active for long.

Yeah.....and did you go to the auction and check out the description for it?

Here it is in its entirety:

"AF 15. Condition is Acceptable. Shipped with USPS Priority Mail Express."

Who in the hell legitimately sells an Amazing Fantasy #15 in that manner?

Link to sold book

 

Edited January 16 by Domo Arigato

[Chip Cataldo]

On 1/16/2024 at 5:30 PM, Buzzetta said:

 

Tell me what you're saying without telling me what you're saying.

I turned things around 180 degrees. We'll see if he eventually can.

Edited January 16 by Chip Cataldo

[Chip Cataldo]

On 1/16/2024 at 5:40 PM, Domo Arigato said:

Yeah.....and did you go to the auction and check out the description for it?

Here it is in its entirety:

"AF 15. Condition is Acceptable. Shipped with USPS Priority Mail Express."

Who in the hell legitimately sells an Amazing Fantasy #15 in that manner?

 

I didn't click on it, no. Definitely a situation where he pointed someone to it.

[bc]

On 1/16/2024 at 3:40 PM, Sauce Dog said:

I believe the intermingling part at this point, since everything has become so disorganized that books have been separated from their info (I have sent him the customer information for that Tales of Suspense which he lost, so now he has the info to return that order), but who knows...it's too much me to verify at this point with my limited connection to all this.

I told him NOT to post here again until he had returned a good deal of customer orders so he could show actual action was taken - not empty promises. Everything on my end talking with him and seeing the tracking numbers, confirming delivery with other board members has actually happened and shown him to be actually trying to make things right. So from my side/perspective things were looking positive)

As for the master list....I have access to a backup of the submission system before 2021, so at least for the very oldest of submissions I know I can help. For everything else newer, that was stored online via the system http://jotform.com but it sounds like he does not have access to it any longer (maybe unpaid account fees?) but it looks like the database is still hosted there, so it might be possible to get access to it again in the future.

Any master list (and pics) should be published here so the collectors and dealers can identify and handle the books accordingly. 

-bc

[phretbored]

Saucedog deserves much thanks for putting time and effort into helping some people get their books back.

He didn't have to help out at all but thankfully he went above and beyond.

Hopefully more books get returned.

The wildcard here is always going to be Mike.

It's possible that KindaMistyish and Mike both have addiction issues.

 

[Domo Arigato]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:57 PM, Nick Furious said:

My gut is that he's buying time hoping to get Ebay payouts before they freeze everything from people reporting that he's selling their stolen books.  

This.

 

[JC25427N]

Is the FBI involved yet?

Oh wait sorry wrong thread.....

 

[Domo Arigato]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:02 PM, Sauce Dog said:

GUYS THIS IS GETTING CRAZIER. Mike has contacted me! He can't get into his account here for the moment, so maybe a post from him later.

Apparently some of those sold listings were cancelled by him (but still appear as sold under ebay searches) when he noticed the mistake. Apparently he has his own comic collection, and with everything going on lots of them have been mixed up with customer books - so when he lists an item for sale he is 'getting books mixed up' but once he catches the mistake (finding the right copy he owns) he cancels the sale (which is what happened with this tales of suspense).

@ZappedMoose9995 Your book is still in his possession!!! I will get him your invoice and he will have it put together for return as your customer notes he lost on it.

Also, as I thought...the meth claim is false, and apparently well...better you read it from the horses mouth:


 

I don't believe any of what he told you here for a second.

That Tales of Supense book just sold on Ebay five days ago.  It's entirely possible he just hadn't mailed it yet.....so he's able to post proof that he still has it and can now cancel the Ebay sale since it's been flagged in here.

And now.....it's the person who posted the "bomb" post in here that is the meth head?  

Wait....correction.....a homeless meth head that lost her kids and is a professional thief. 

You know.....the type of person you would invite in so they could steal your second set of keys....and now, lo and behold, there are a number of customer books that are unaccounted for.  How convenient.

 

[Chip Cataldo]

If she's homeless, how did she get to sit down at a computer and create an account and post in here?

[CameronWV]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:21 PM, Beige said:

So has anyone actually gone to the cops yet?

 

This guy has been enabled by non-action for so long that he doesn't care.

 

This is what I don't understand. As someone who used to work in law enforcement I can tell you that this whole thing is absolutely criminal at this point. I also don't buy the "well the cops won't take us serious because it's comic books" take either. We are talking 10s of thousands of dollars here. 

[bc]

On 1/16/2024 at 6:57 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

If she's homeless, how did she get to sit down at a computer and create an account and post in here?

That post was likely created on a phone by the formatting.

Give them kudo's for the wall of text without any edits.

-bc