Is this guy a thief?

Linda · Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 8:07 pm Post subject: Is this guy a thief?

About 4 years ago I bought a ton on stuff from a "top collector" in Europe who was selling his whole collection. It turned out to be a hoax. His pictures were from other people's websites and only a few people ever received games. I think he really sold a couple to make himself seem legit. Anyway, I could almost swear these are the same pictures used by that thief.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Rare-Col.....dZViewItem
[Archived: 280172171493 ]

Does anyone remember that guy?
Does this collection look familiar to anyone?
Note this seller has only 17 feedbacks, but he's bought tons of games. Seems suspicious. The worst part of the fiasco 4 years ago was after I bought from him on ebay the guy was nice enough to sell me a huge number of games from my want list that he had laying around. What a swell guy. I was so young... Embarassed

I really think these are the same pics.

Linda

Dan · Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 9:00 pm Post subject:

Doesn't ring any bells with me, but if he thinks he's going to get over $30 for a loose Coleco Baseball, it doesn't sound to me like he knows a whole lot about handhelds... You usually can't give those things away.

tanatron · Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 11:40 pm Post subject:

Linda ,you know what you might be in the right direction.I'm not saying anything, but something dosn't seem right to me too!I've been in touch with this guy since his first auction several days back.His name is Jo.Since he was selling his whole collection I told him that I was willing to buy some of the boxed and rare games that he said to have.He said he was more than happy to do it.But when I asked him a short list of the games we exchanged several emails in which he asked me what games I would have liked to buy.After some other emails he abrouptly ended the conversation saying that: FIRST that he was the biggest collector in the UK then that he was certaintly in the top ten.Make up your mind!Then he said that he had all the games including all 3 Rosys ,Frog Prince and ALL the other rarest games and that he wanted to make ,as he said "hundreds" on those.
Hey! if a collector tells you that he's ready to buy for a lot of money your games , you have to pay him attention!! It 's you that is selling the games!! FinEngeneer (John) docet (teaches)!!
Yesterday I asked him to have some more information on the Earth Invaders that he was selling and why he said that the box was in AVERAGE condition when from the photo didn't seem like that.Keep in mind that on the other auctions of boxed games there are some REALLY poor boxes but he dosn't mention anything about them.
The bottom line? He has not answered me yet!
I don't know what to say! I might be COMPLETELY wrong, but there is something that is not right in this picture and those feedbacks might be the key! Where did he get all those games?

Alex
_________________
My collection: http://www.webalice.it/claudia.alessandro/index.html

Rik · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 2:56 am Post subject:

Tell him you _really_ want a Tiger Star Castle Tabletop in ANY condition... Or a Coleco Star Trek. See if he says he has either of those games.. Cool

What's his Email address? I have these exact same pictures that were sent to me by a collector back in January of 2003. He signed off his Email with 'lew' (not sure if that's a name, or a foreign word for 'by' or 'thanks' or something...). At the time he wasn't selling, he was just talking about getting games, and how he just completed his Rosy 3D collection. While the pictures I have are clearly of the exact same collection, I don't have a matching pic for all 4 of them in the auction (different angles), but I do have a couple of them. The Email I have for this guy from 2003 begins with 'ismyidea'.

He's already got feedback from the last week for selling several handhelds, so this might actually be the real owner of this collection, not sure. You'd think he would have new pictures after 4 years though... And I would also suspect that if he was just trying to rip people off, he'd accept international orders. It's much easier to steal people's money overseas than in your own country (and less chance of them showing up on your doorstep to 'collect'... ).

Sounds like he's kind of an jerk though...

Rik

Dan · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 6:45 am Post subject:

Well, he does say "overseas please email me." I'll bet he actually has this group of pretty common games to auction to the UK and he's going to take the foreign collectors for whatever he can with promises of boxed rares.

Linda · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 10:56 am Post subject:

It sounds like the same guy. He used a screen name like GoodWins or something like that. The first bidders got their games and the later he disappeared. I was able to get a refund and someone ( I think from my credit card company) told me he had defrauded paypal out of thousands. Paypal didn't even try to argue the case with the credit card company, they knew about the guy and was just giving refunds on all complaints against him without further investigation.

He swore he had everything, but his camera was always broken so he couldn't take pictures, or he would send pictures from other sites. I really was young... Embarassed

I like the idea of the Star Castle Tabletop Sting. I think I may try it.

tanatron · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 11:11 am Post subject:

His email address begins with Wildhogs8@......... (I don't want to be sued for violation of the privacy).

Alex
_________________
My collection: http://www.webalice.it/claudia.alessandro/index.html

Linda · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 11:19 am Post subject:

Well I've baited the trap. I'll see what he responds. He's probably reading this message thread so the element of surprise is gone.

Linda

elepla · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 1:53 pm Post subject:

Still those pictures are really nice.
With all the multiple copies lined up nicely!

Reminds a bit of the big pile of Coleco Pac Man games in Emeraldr collection pics : )

Also nice to see which games are rare and which are not (Galaxy2, Firefox F7, Gakken Frogger)

Neil UK · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 2:49 pm Post subject:

Thanks for the warning folks. I'll stay well clear of this chap.

What is the black game next to the 2 Dracula games in the left picture? Is it a modernish LCD game?

Neil.

Dan · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 2:54 pm Post subject:

Neil, that's a Tiger R-Zone Super Screen.

http://www.handheldmuseum.com/Tiger/RZoneSuperScreen.htm

Neil UK · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 3:41 pm Post subject:

Thanks Dan. I've never clicked on that one before.

WOW! 4xD batteries for an LCD game. That must be some great backlighting!

I thought it looked a little out of place. It's 10+ years newer that anything else in the collection I think.

Neil.

Rik · Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2007 9:24 pm Post subject:

Dan · Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 2:00 pm Post subject: