Jeanine Raab spent a lot of time online last year searching eBay.com for an old magazine. She was looking for anything to do with the 1950s. Raab wanted Life magazines from that time and found four for $67 on the site from a seller called 'Apropos Auctions.' It read check or money order only.
After Raab put the check in the mail, weeks passed and she saw nothing. The seller said the merchandise was in the mail, but the magazines never arrived.Benjamin Anderson is the man who owns Apropos Auctions.
The ABC15 Investigators uncovered a federal search warrant through the U.S. Postal Inspector’s office. It lists about 225 complaints against Anderson and his company. They're investigating him for mail fraud and money laundering.Dan Schultz of Tempe tried to buy a vintage Life magazine from Apropos Auctions.
When his merchandise didn’t arrive, he phoned the company. Schultz said the voicemail identified himself as Colby Farnan at Apropos Auctions. And when he searched for Colby Farnan online what he discovered disgusted him. “Colby Farnan memorial is on a web site called Fallen Heroes Memorial,” he said. The site was made to honor Pfc. Colby Farnan who was killed by an explosive device in Iraq. “It just stuck in my craw that he was doing this to these young men who had served in Iraq and who died,” said Schultz.
We found similar complaints online in other cases when Anderson used names of fallen soldiers as sellers.Neighbors said Anderson moved out of his California home but it will be hard to know if he's still in business, online and using yet another name.
To protect yourself, use an online payment service. In most cases, the seller doesn't get the money until you get the item.
Reported by: Joe Ducey
11 comments:
To all blog readers;
The two con men in the article about Apropos Auctions have been cheating people all over the world.
Benjamin Joseph Anderson and his circle of friends including Meir Avraham Waknine have been running this scam for years. It is only with the diligent work of individuals disgusted by their use of deceased veteran identities that anything is being done. Please write any complaint you have immediately about the company known as Apropos Auctions to the Assistant US Attorney in San Diego so prosecution can proceed. These two have been calling and leaving death threats among other threats to any and all victims they've conned in the past. They are really feeling afraid right now since their computers were confiscated. They must know that their ring of friends will be made public. Perhaps someone named Nichol already blabbed Ben? Or was it Adeline? Or Bozell? Or all of them. You're friends are lying to your face telling you they haven't said anything, when they've said practically everything they can to save themselves. You are all going to jail soon and it could not happen to a nicer bunch.
The owners of the fraudulent Apropos Auctions under Federal investigation Ben Anderson and Meir Waknine have many new ebay identities in use. The current ones include
bernkeesing - just closed
reiscajon1 - just closed
gatongame1 - open and starting to transact
eatonwell6051 - open and starting to take orders
peckheim1 - down to 89% and getting a lot of negative feedback so it will close soon.
saunderscase858 - open and taking orders
older names include the now closed
euchur
micahona
feccaforever1
lindsen39
Other sites which closed accounts they used under the names of
waybackvintageads
vintageads08
As a result of these and other criminal activities Ebay has changed its transaction policy. No more checks or money orders are allowed which means these two can't alter the backs of checks anymore or use false names. Their PayPal accounts are easily halted from getting money when they don't delivery merchandise.
EBAY SCAMS: WatsonValley1 Saunderscase858 Eatonwell6051 abforsyth62 siminisales ebay sellers
January 9, 2009 by watsonvalley1
Watsonvalley1, and Saunderscase858 retailers on ebay are Apropos Auctions, and owners Ben Anderson and Meir Waknine, that are under Federal Investigation for mail fraud.
This seller is also currently known as
watsonvalley1
eatonwell6051
siminisales
abforsyth62
gatongame1 - no longer registered skipped town as of 1.8.09
peckheim1 - no longer registered skipped out on buyers 1.8.09
on ebay.
Selling magazine ads and not shipping with each case.
US Attorney for case number: 08MJ0672
in San Diego, CA Federal District Court.
Federal Magistrate issued warrant is on file and can be viewed at:
http://10newsblogs.com/pdf/search.pdf
See:
Apro Auctions
Apropos Auctions
Apropas Auctions
Apropo Auctions
Meir Avraham Waknine
Benjamin Joseph Anderson
saunderscase858
eatonwell6051
watsonvalley1
siminisales
abforsyth62
See their other former shut down names on ebay:
gatongame1 - operated less than two months then disappeared
peckheim1
reiscajon1
blankleycanyon
micahona
bernkeesing
euchur
kinglseyart1
tealbarkes
larspark916
boylediff
feccaforever1
lindsen39
lltoolbox
yosupzx3
chainxx
casencrate
cc_win
coldnightwarmheart
cottontailbonsall
eagertopleaseyou
kilpela255
kiqts
liqoxt
mergewillmergetime
newmonbusme
oldcrowe714
philedmundson
ponponfish7
qxots
seaskyspeed
seashellsbeach
squzot
starcoffeebucks
tobecold
vwots
xinizt
xovw1
xqirx
yatessean1
zwoxt
Scammers Ben Anderson and Meir Waknine are at it again and Ebay still has not stopped them.
I can send you a long list of new ids, 4 of those at least being active right now and collecting many more victims.
I can confirm that Dan Schultz and Richard Rivette like to suck dick.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 10, 2009
eBay scam seller exposed!
eBay scam seller has new names:
kkcisco & docdaltonca.
Old names:
sutterlach, kiharavictory, woodwouldwin1, timpsacwind, martin2029valley1, ingymarc1, grims_mistress, terrianleaf, webbemil1, eatonwell6051, mirenotdire1, watsonvalley1, saunderscase858.
I have been following and reporting them since Dec '08 to eBay. Please do the same.
This guy hurts honest ad/magazine sellers . He drives potential customers away with every scam he pulls. We need to come together to fight this person and keep him off eBay.
eBay does little to nothing about it until people lose money and start giving him negative feedback.
Paypal also does nothing to monitor his activities.
He uses a different g-mail account for each user name.
He has 2,000-3,500 items running at a time, often with 0 feedback.
POSTED BY EBAY SCAMMER AT 8:10 PM
LABELS: EBAY, EXPOSED, SCAM, SCAMMER
Brett said...
Unfortunately, I am one of this guys victims. The bad part about this is that this was my first purchase on ebay, and more than likely my last. If ebay can't keep this kind of stuff under control then I'll take my money somewhere else. Now I have to track down this sutterlach guy, find out his real info, and deal with him myself. Which by the way, do you know of any other useful info such as an IP address. That would be great.... I'll do my best to spread the word.
JUNE 22, 2009 3:19 PM
eBay scammer said...
Brett, I am sorry to hear that you were one of the many duped by this guy. The majority of the rest of us that sell on eBay are very honest, and I would hope you could re-think using eBay again. I have sold on eBay since 1999, personally racking up a 99.8% positive FB rating with over 5,000 Feedback. This joker has screwed up so many people on eBay, we have lost many customers because of him. eBay will not give out anyy info on this guy. There is a TV station in New England that wants to do a story on this. There is also a lawyer who got scammed by this guy and is going to start a class action lawsuit. I will get those names posted on my blog within a few days...keep watching for my updates.
JUNE 23, 2009 8:56 PM
The person with id truthteller is the real scammer, not Mr Krebs.
Not a single word said about Mr Krebs is true. Truthteller is merely attempting extortion on Mr Krebs.
Truthteller in Fresno is in reality a scammer we have been monitoring for 2 years on Ebay. His real name is Ben Anderson and he works with another scammer called Meir Waknine.
Their scam game is to sell old ads and old magazines (especially Time, Life, National Geographic and Playboy) by the thousands on Ebay, using 100s of Ebay seller ids they created ahead of time. These scammers also created many Google gmail email addresses which are hardest (but not impossible) to trace. Additionally they use stock photos of the items which they copy from othe sites.
Of course they do not own the items in the photos, so they cannot deliver them. Do not send them therefore any money.
If they bully you, let me know so we can address that.
Also complain with Ebay. They know that he is a scammer (1000s of Ebay users reported Anderson to Ebay in the past, but they have taken no action to stop him permanently yet.)
Note that Ben Anderson and Meir Waknine were even the subject of a local TV station's broadcast on online scammers and they were also visited by their local DA in California.
Anyone who has had recent encounters with these two, please let me know.
Here is a limited partial list of Ebay ids they use or used to scam on Ebay (They have many more such ids.): woodraningle,
amplecyders, Ralph Cyders con cuenta email, amplecyders@gmail.com
switzardino1, manzomo, sscow84, kkisco, docdaltonca, woodwouldwin1, kiharavictory, sutterlach, siminisales, balznbombs, zeigercounter, elayemle, pavlicpark, oceantuski, etc
Ben Anderson is act is again. And he's using the name Ben Swan in Michigan. He's also using another woman named Oksana Maritych who is also using the false last name of Swan. BEWARE!!!!
Who is he?
Who is he?
Ben Swan is Benjamin Joseph Anderson. He is with Oksana Maritych and they have a baby - Sophia.
He is harassing his uncle's family Chuck Carr in Cass City, Michigan because he thinks Jacob Carr stole his vintage magazine collection in California.
Are you sure? When?
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