Chopperguys...disappeared with our mods?

[charmed412]

I was with Sugar_and_Spice when she paid a visit to him. I did not go to the door with her but I could hear most of the conversation from the car. She offered to go in and help him locate her Darwin and the others in question for him. He refused. He refused even though he knew we had driven from West Virginia to New Jersey to get it. IMHO, family issues or not, he has had ample time to get settled and get unpacked and do what's right. At this point, he isn't a guy with family issues, he is a criminal and should be treated as such. Thousands of people go through the things he has gone through and still handled business. Those mods, finished or not, should have never been packed. He should have contacted (or had the friends who were posting for him) contact the owners and arranged for them to be sent back before he moved.

 

[Sugar_and_Spice]

You are right, it is criminal, if it had been me, I'd left his house with my Darwin, or.......well......you know

I think the being understanding portion of this has long since past, he supposedly had a family tragedy happen in June?

Yet, the OP says he was told that his pv was finished in April, let's see here, that's April, May.....June, it doesn't take that long to get stuff mailed out.

Whether he had a personal tragedy or not, which, to be honest, I can't find in me once ounce of sympathy for him, because I'm calling b.s..

In my work, I run into con men every single day and night, I know how they operate, I know how they think, the way they talk, this guy is a con man, the mark is there, he was leading people on for months prior to all of this stuff supposedly happened, and let's say it did happen, what about the months prior. There is no excuse.

I really do hope you guys get your stuff back, but I feel it is likely you won't, most likely, the best you can hope for are a criminal investigation, and this is likely something the FBI won't care about, small potatoes, which leaves you in the hands of local law enforcement, that's a crap shoot at best. Your best bet is to band together in a civil suit, or, maybe the best way to go, IMHO, is a bunch of little small claims civil suits, which in the end might not be worth the financial gain, but after a judgement you can really begin to harass him financially, liens, garnishments, and what not.

Being female and a senior citizen I certainly was no match for him. He did keep looking past me to see who I had in the car with me. Too bad I didnt have you or a big bruiser with me, things might have turned out differently.

 

[charmed412]

Sorry....not so much the big bruiser type.

 

[dejavoodoo]

There ARE free computers in any public library, even the tiny podunk town I live in. One hardly needs an internet connection in the house anymore.

A smartphone at any Starubucks would do the trick.

 

[supervape]

Says a lot About the folks sticking up for him and delivering messages for him... Hope they are not involved some how.. Sorry to speculate but what would one do with that many mods

On Tapatalk via my Mobile

 

[Sugar_and_Spice]

Sorry....not so much the big bruiser type.

Silly of course I wasn't referring to you. You know I was talking about big strong men.....lol

 

[TheSneakerHoarder]

Well, I'm glad the elephant in the room (room=old thread) is now out.

Just hope we can figure something out--I sent paypal a message about the transaction back months ago so hopefully we can recoup that bit of cash. As far as our mods--I'm the type that doesn't bother talking. I'd rather swing a few times and pry my property out of someone's hand if they had it.

I'm going to try and get as many of the scammed members to see/reply in this thread and try and get a better understanding of the scope of this betrayal.

 

[jkmtwo]

Being female and a senior citizen I certainly was no match for him. He did keep looking past me to see who I had in the car with me. Too bad I didnt have you or a big bruiser with me, things might have turned out differently.

I promise you, had I been with you it would have been a bad day for him, tbh, it shows a lot of stones on your part that you went there in the first place.

A few years ago, in a 1 year period, my best friends grandfather passed away, who was like my adopted gpa, my little brother, died, my dad died, my uncle on my moms side died, my wife's cousin died, who we named our daughter after 2 months later when she was born, and then my grandpa died. I managed to keep the family construction company moving along, and still be a bounty hunter at night, you know why? Because I had obligations, mouths to feed, people have tragedies happen every day, they don't quit for months and keep peoples stuff hanging in the balance, stuff they spent hundreds of dollars on, and that's not counting the money that he got paid.

 

[Racehorse]

Your best bet is to band together in a civil suit, or, maybe the best way to go, IMHO, is a bunch of little small claims civil suits, which in the end might not be worth the financial gain, but after a judgement you can really begin to harass him financially, liens, garnishments, and what not.

Lawsuits cost money. Suggesting he be harrassed is a very bad idea, IMHO. If he is judgement-proof, you won't get anything anyway, and if you do, it will be piece-meal, drawn out, and you will still be dealing with this 8 years from now.

I'll just repeat:

I would contact that local police as well as postmaster where you sent your stuff and find out what your OPTIONS for filing complaints are, and let them direct you from there.

Find out what your Protections are, under the law, and go from there.

Any suggestions of individuals "intervening" is also a bad idea.......this is precisely how bad things happen, fights and such that end up in the newspapers.

Mail fraud is a very serious business. If you've ever brought such a claim, then you know of what I speak. We're talking FEDERAL crime, people. Find out from the postmaster there exactly how to do this, based on NUMEROUS mailings arriving to this person, and being scammed.

And contact the local police, get their thoughts on how to proceed.

Please, all this macho bravado about taking things into your own hands, etc. is not a good idea at all.


P.S. the forum members who were somehow sworn to secrecy regarding what is going on with this man.....ones that were in contact with him by phone, etc. need to step up. Now that this situation has become one in which there will be legal and possible federal repurcussons.....it's now gone beyond the point of "my friend has a right to his privacy". Sorry, but he lost those rights by his actions, and deserves no protections, under the law or otherwise.

 

[Racehorse]

I'm the type that doesn't bother talking. I'd rather swing a few times and pry my property out of someone's hand if they had it.

I'm going to try and get as many of the scammed members to see/reply in this thread and try and get a better understanding of the scope of this betrayal.

I can't support this "get a posse together" type of thinking....Its' very gang-like, hoodie stuff and once you give up talking you have placed yourself in the position of relying on brute physical solutions. This never turns out well. At the very least, pushing and shouting, broken arm or something........at the very worst, something much worse. (work in an ER and you will see these things every day.)

Please, please guys....... pursue this thru "proper" channels.

Leave the macho guy stuff to people who understand how to do this stuff, like "Dog, the Bounty Hunter."

 

[jkmtwo]

Lawsuits cost money. Suggesting he be harrassed is a very bad idea, IMHO. If he is judgement-proof, you won't get anything anyway, and if you do, it will be piece-meal, drawn out, and you will still be dealing with this 8 years from now.

That's part of the point, of course lawsuits cost money, money that he will be responsible for when a judgement is awarded. The ultimate point would not be to get the money back, the point is to keep him from doing this sort of thing to other people.

I have done this before, the way it works is once you get a judgement against him, you wait for a little while, when you don't get any money back, you can place a lien on any vehicles he owns, houses, boats, anything in his name. If he goes to get a credit card he will be denied, if he goes to sell his car he will not be able to, until he deals with the lien, and gets a release of lien. Now imagine this times 20. We haven't even discussed garnishment of wages yet.

The problem with the criminal route, and no one has said not to go that route as well, but I can tell you now, its not going to happen, its too small. There's no actual mail fraud here, and even if there were, the chances that anything would come of it are slim and none. The best avenue criminally speaking will be with local authorities, but even still its a crap shoot.

 

[JENerationX]

I'm sorry for everyone that's had a mod go missing, and thankful that I personally haven't come across any scammers in the vaping community myself.

Thank you to everyone that has come forward and talked about it. It's a wake up call for the rest of us to be careful about who we trust with our mods and our money.

 

[jkmtwo]

I can't support this "get a posse together" type of thinking....Its' very gang-like, hoodie stuff and once you give up talking you have placed yourself in the position of relying on brute physical solutions. This never turns out well. At the very least, pushing and shouting, broken arm or something........at the very worst, something much worse. (work in an ER and you will see these things every day.)

Please, please guys....... pursue this thru "proper" channels.

Leave the macho guy stuff to people who understand how to do this stuff, like "Dog, the Bounty Hunter."

Who mentioned finding the guy and doing that? Seriously? Its nice to get sanctimonious,but seriously no one said one damn word about going and doing actual harm to him.

 

[martinc]

Given the fact that chopperguys had family troubles,most probably house troubles (that part of the state was under a disaster zone at some point in time)+ whatever we dont know everybody knows that sometimes,when it rains,it pours)...

I`d give that guy a holler,he seem to know and be in somewhat of a contact with him but since he moved,I have no idea what you could do from then on...good luck.

What I know about the situation - Eminent Vapor

 

[Unforeseen]

On behalf of the ECF, I would like to apologize to all parties involved in this situation. It is truly unfortunate and hopefully there will be some resolution to this matter in the near future.

As stated on Chopperguys thread. His status as a supplier has been revoked until he resolves member related issues.

 

[TheSneakerHoarder]

I can't support this "get a posse together" type of thinking....Its' very gang-like, hoodie stuff and once you give up talking you have placed yourself in the position of relying on brute physical solutions. This never turns out well. At the very least, pushing and shouting, broken arm or something........at the very worst, something much worse. (work in an ER and you will see these things every day.)

Please, please guys....... pursue this thru "proper" channels.

Leave the macho guy stuff to people who understand how to do this stuff, like "Dog, the Bounty Hunter."

I didn't mean it like that--I'm just puzzled as to why it took me, one who is very busy and isn't on the board a whole lot to get this ball rolling.

 

[TheSneakerHoarder]

I'm sorry for everyone that's had a mod go missing, and thankful that I personally haven't come across any scammers in the vaping community myself.

Thank you to everyone that has come forward and talked about it. It's a wake up call for the rest of us to be careful about who we trust with our mods and our money.

I'm still puzzled as to why I am the first to come forward with this travesty.

 

[Unforeseen]

Just a reminder to all those that are reading this post. Chopperguys thread was partly closed because it was starting to become pretty ugly. I'm fully aware that the intention of this thread was for support to members that have lost their APV's. So, please keep this discussion clean.


Thanks

 

[HolaAmigos]

I shared my sympathies on his thread for other members...not getting their Mods and got basically hammered for doing so
People were rude and very inconsiderate...
We were told that we should wait up to a year for our Mods.
I have consideration for peoples' personal lives taken a turn for the worse, but when all is said and done, that person is still running a business, regardless, and should at least make an attempt to keep some type of open line of communication.

I was also shocked how people were so quick to jump on all of us...
Who were wanting to know when we might possibly expect to get some type of information in regards to our Mods.
We waited and waited, we gave every benefit of the doubt, now it's time for some answers, if we can possibly hope to get any.

To those members who never received their Mods, I do apologize, I really am sorry
I do feel bad because I was the one of the member's who was bumping Choppers' thread in the beginning

I am very sorry

 

[lotsoffish]

I'm willing to bet good money that he's sold all the PVs that were sent to him. If you're hurting for money it's alot easier to sell other peoples items than your own. Probably figured he could claim them lost in transit or something. Either way I feel sorry for the people who were scammed, but I'd give up hope of having the items returned at this point.

I thought about that BUT how would he even sell them all without leaving some sort of evidence on the Internet? VERY high end mods are NOT something you can sell on a street corner. There would be old links to Craigs list ads and some sort of trail on the Internet.

Imagine if somebody suddenly had all these high end PV's and was selling them left and right. At the very least somebody that bought one of them would find this forum and reveal some information regarding this.

I still say the best bet is to simply find this guy and offer to assist him in returning everyone's gear. I bet he would be more than happy to let somebody else clean this up for him.