Former Mastro Auctions president Doug Allen to plead guilty in sports-memorabilia fraud case
Allen, who founded Legendary Auctions immediately after Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009, will become the third executive from the defunct company to plead guilty to fraud.
BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, August 1, 2014, 2:56 PM
Former Mastro Auctions president Doug Allen, indicted on 14 counts of mail and wire fraud in July 2012, is scheduled to plead guilty when he appears in Chicago federal court on Aug. 11.
Allen, who founded Legendary Auctions immediately after Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009, will become the third executive from the defunct company to plead guilty to fraud.
Founder Bill Mastro pleaded guilty to fraud in October and faces up to five years in prison. Former Mastro executive Mark Theotikos, indicted on six counts of fraud two years ago, is expected to plead guilty when he appears in Chicago federal court on Tuesday.
Allen, who pleaded not guilty to the charges shortly after the indictment was unsealed, was scheduled to go to trial on the criminal charges in September. Court records filed late Thursday announcing the change of plea hearing do not specify a possible sentence for Allen.
Allen did not return a call for comment.
William Boehm, Mastro Auction’s former director of information technology, was also named in the 2012 indictment and is scheduled to go to trial next month. Boehm is accused of lying to federal investigators.
Mastro agreed to cooperate with investigators and will be formally sentences after the cases against his former business associates are completed, faces up to five years in prison.
The indictment alleges that Allen and his colleagues routinely defrauded customers by rigging its auctions through shill bidding.
Mastro, once one of the most powerful executives in the sports-memorabilia industry, has acknowledged that he engaged in shill bidding and also admitted trimming the world’s most expensive baseball card, the T206 Honus Wagner once owned by NHL star Wayne Gretzky that Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick purchased in 2007 for $2.8 million.
Mastro Auctions, known for providing collectors with unique and expensive baseball cards and collectibles, was sports memorabilia’s most important company as the hobby evolved from a sleepy pastime into a multi-billion industry in the 1990s and 2000s.
But it all began crashing down in 2007, as the Daily News first reported, when the FBI’s Chicago office launched an investigation into sports-memorabilia fraud. Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009.
In January, the FBI raided the Arkansas home and office of an investor in Legendary Auctions, John Rogers, the owner of a photo archive company.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/i-...#ixzz39CEMJMS3
Allen, who founded Legendary Auctions immediately after Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009, will become the third executive from the defunct company to plead guilty to fraud.
BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, August 1, 2014, 2:56 PM
Former Mastro Auctions president Doug Allen, indicted on 14 counts of mail and wire fraud in July 2012, is scheduled to plead guilty when he appears in Chicago federal court on Aug. 11.
Allen, who founded Legendary Auctions immediately after Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009, will become the third executive from the defunct company to plead guilty to fraud.
Founder Bill Mastro pleaded guilty to fraud in October and faces up to five years in prison. Former Mastro executive Mark Theotikos, indicted on six counts of fraud two years ago, is expected to plead guilty when he appears in Chicago federal court on Tuesday.
Allen, who pleaded not guilty to the charges shortly after the indictment was unsealed, was scheduled to go to trial on the criminal charges in September. Court records filed late Thursday announcing the change of plea hearing do not specify a possible sentence for Allen.
Allen did not return a call for comment.
William Boehm, Mastro Auction’s former director of information technology, was also named in the 2012 indictment and is scheduled to go to trial next month. Boehm is accused of lying to federal investigators.
Mastro agreed to cooperate with investigators and will be formally sentences after the cases against his former business associates are completed, faces up to five years in prison.
The indictment alleges that Allen and his colleagues routinely defrauded customers by rigging its auctions through shill bidding.
Mastro, once one of the most powerful executives in the sports-memorabilia industry, has acknowledged that he engaged in shill bidding and also admitted trimming the world’s most expensive baseball card, the T206 Honus Wagner once owned by NHL star Wayne Gretzky that Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick purchased in 2007 for $2.8 million.
Mastro Auctions, known for providing collectors with unique and expensive baseball cards and collectibles, was sports memorabilia’s most important company as the hobby evolved from a sleepy pastime into a multi-billion industry in the 1990s and 2000s.
But it all began crashing down in 2007, as the Daily News first reported, when the FBI’s Chicago office launched an investigation into sports-memorabilia fraud. Mastro Auctions went out of business in 2009.
In January, the FBI raided the Arkansas home and office of an investor in Legendary Auctions, John Rogers, the owner of a photo archive company.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/i-...#ixzz39CEMJMS3
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