He made a deal with you to sell you X number of cards
- at X dollars? - Correct.
And you just ghost him, you don't respond?
I was still paying him.
So I just wanna let you know that when I was a young girl,
I did collect baseball cards.
I'm not even gonna tell you who the players were
because then that would date me, so I'm not gonna do that.
Ty Cobb?
[laughter]
Ignore him.
[announcer] Now on Tribunal Justice.
["Ride of the Valkyries" plays]
[announcer] Today's case was filed in McKinney, Texas.
Your Honor, this is case number 2049 Taylor versus McLain.
All parties have been sworn in.
- Thank you, Cassandra. - You're welcome.
You may be seated.
[Judge Levy] All right.
Mr. Taylor, you sold the defendant
16 high-end basketball cards for $56,000
according to your complaint.
You had Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and others.
You say that the defendant gave you a check for $56,000.
He took possession of the cards.
You deposited his check
and then you were notified by the bank that the check did not clear.
You contacted the defendant.
He made good on some of the payments, he stopped,
and you claim he owes you over $20,000.
You're suing him for $10,000 because that's the jurisdictional limit.
- Is that correct? - Yes, Your Honor.
Before I go on to the defendant's case, I wanna ask you,
did the defendant tell you why he believed that the check bounced?
He said he was waiting on a wire transfer from a broker.
Yes. Stockbroker, wire transfer was supposed to come through.
It never did and got delayed.
Did he ever tell you that the check was cancelled?
- [Jeffrey] No. - He didn't tell you
- that he stopped payment on it? - No.
Okay. Now, Mr. McLain, you say you don't know what he's talking about.
What you say is that you bought seven cards for $25,000.
There were other cards that you had on consignment
and when you sold those cards, you were gonna split the money with him.
But the price and the value of the cards, they went down.
You offered him the cards back. He said, "No."
And this is where we are. Is that right?
Um, partly.
We met five hours from my house at a baseball card shop.
We had done two prior deals to this, which were fine.
So this is the third deal.
We met, he showed me the cards,
and I said, "What do you value these cards at?"
- And he said, "Around 25,000." - How many--
- how many cards are we talking about? - Seven.
So you say seven cards
but you very clearly in your complaint say 16 high-end cards.
And then it wasn't 25,000, you say it was 56,000.
- So right off the bat, you don't know... - I know what I'm talking about.
- ... what he's talking about... - He doesn't know what he's talking about.
[Judge Levy] ... and you don't know what he's talking about.
No. I think he's confusing two different deals.
And I would tend to agree.
So Mr. Taylor, a moment ago
- when I asked you about that check... - Uh-hmm.
... because that would seem to me to be the smoking gun in this case.
- [Jeffrey] Uh-hmm. - You say he gave you $56,000 check.
Did you ever give him a $56,000 check?
- No. - [Judge Levy] No.
But you said to me very clearly a moment ago
was that you thought that he didn't have the money
but that he most certainly did not stop payment
or cancel that check.
- You said that, right? - As far as I know...
- [Judge Levy] Well, as far as you know. - I mean, I don't--I don't--no.
- He didn't tell that to you. - He didn't tell me anything. No.
So, show me a copy of the $56,000 cancelled check.
I do not have a copy of that. It was ATM--it was ATM deposited.
Yeah. Is that what you expect all of us to believe
that you put a check into the ATM and poof, it goes to ATM heaven?
Listen, you go into your bank on the computer
and you can pick up the actual copy.
They show you what the front of the check is,
what the back of the check is.
So you have the one bank that that doesn't happen to?
I do not have a copy of that check.
[Judge Levy] Yeah, of course not.
You wanna know why you don't have a copy of the check?
Because he never wrote a check for this deal.
Now, you want him to pay you $10,000, your burden of proof.
And by the way, this was July 10th, right?
July 10th is when you guys met at the shop?
- Yes. - Yes. Like two years ago.
[Judge Levy] Yeah. Right? Good. Show me a bill of sale
for 16 cards.
- A bill of sale? - [Judge Levy] Yeah, bill of sale.
I collected baseball cards for 20 years.
I always got a bill of sale.
Why don't you explain to us what happened. What really happened?
Uh, we met. He's from Dallas and I'm five hours south.
We met at a baseball card shop. He walked in with the cards.
I said, "What do you think they're worth?"
If I remember exactly, the conversation was like, "Around 25,000, 26,000."
I said, "When I get home, um, I've got some money coming from a brokerage.
I will pay you.
I'm gonna check the values out of the card and make sure we're on the same page."
[Judge Levy] Okay, stop.
Mr. McLain, you don't want me doing to you what I just did to him, right?
- No, sir. - [Judge Levy] So stop with the nonsense.
How long have you been buying and selling basketball cards,
collectible cards?
Uh, about five years.
You don't think twice about dropping $25,000 on collectibles, do you?
Not if they're the players that I generally collect, no.
Right. And you want me to believe that you, knowing what you do,
knowing how long you've done it, knowing you're in the business,
went and took possession of cards all for $25,000
and didn't know what the value was?
- Uh... - [Judge Levy] Right?
... not at that exact second, I didn't.
But I don't remember seeing all of them.
He might have sent pictures of them, texting, stuff like that...
- [Judge Levy] Well, that's exactly right. - ... possibly. Yeah.
[Judge Levy] So on July 10th, before you met with him,
you requested that he send you a list
with the price that he had charged for each card.
The next day, plaintiff provides you with a detailed list of 16 cards
including grade and price, right?
Yes, Your Honor.
- [Judge Levy] Right? - Correct.
So now you are acknowledging that it's no longer seven cards
but it's actually 16 cards that this deal included.
- The whole deal, but... - [Judge Levy] Right.
... we didn't do the whole deal.
And the total was $56,700, right?
If I would have got all the cards, that's correct.
I got seven cards, which is what he sued me for.
[Judge Levy] Hold on. And not one text.
Was there any indication that there was anything less than 16 cards?
And then the next set of texts was July 13th.
This is just three days after you purchased the cards.
You say because the current price is drastically reduced,
according to what you saw than the original sale price,
you're willing to keep them
and send him money every few days until paid in full
- or give the cards back? - Correct.
[Judge Levy] But you wanted to knock off $3,000.
- Right. - [Judge Levy] And then you said,
"I can start paying you and get this done inside of the month."
So we know now that there is gonna be a definitive end date
if he doesn't take the cards back
- till the end of July, right? - Correct.
And the total purchase price now became $54,000.
- For the whole collection, yes. - [Judge Levy] 54,000.
You sir, you say to the defendant,
you asked him to send you 2,500, you confirmed.
- The new balance is $51,500, right? - Yes, Your Honor.
- [Judge Levy] Do you remember that? - Correct.
[Judge Levy] And then you agree to send him another wire for $2,500
- and you did, right? - [Brian] Yeah.
- And you got that, right? - Yes, Your Honor.
[Judge Levy] You both agree there was a new balance of 49,000.
But then, August of 2021,
you, Mr. Taylor, find out
that the defendant is selling the cards on eBay.
- Yes, Your Honor. - And that was a surprise to you.
Yes. Yes, Your Honor. Because...
And that is where I'm gonna leave off. Judge Acker.
Was it your understanding, sir,
that you were to pay him back only when you were able to resell the cards?
Correct. And, uh, it was a quick understood consignment,
"Hey, I'm gonna move these for you through eBay,
through auction houses, through my channels."
When did the two of you have that conversation?
- Uh, at that card shop in July... - So in July
when you took possession of the cards,
it's your position that this was a consignment deal?
Yes. And I was going to pay him based on the value he gave me
which I verbally agreed to
and then realized was different once I got home.
The entire market went down for...
Yeah, I'm interested in that but not quite yet.
I just would like a little more background information.
Mr. Taylor, where do the cards come from in the first place?
How do they make their way into the marketplace?
So there is a license agreement between manufacturers of cards
and, um, their perspective league, NBA, NFL, or whatever.
And license agreement allow them to print cards with names and likenesses
and team names and whatnot.
So that's how, um, these manufacturers get the right to produce these cards.
I think we have some of these cards
because these were cards in your possession
that you sold to the defendant?
- [Jeffrey] Yes, Your Honor. - How much is that Steph Curry card worth?
Uh, the one on the right is worth roughly today around $800.
$700 to $800.
How about the one on the left?
[Jeffrey] Um, that one is about 400, 500.
I'm not buying them, by the way. I'm just...
[laughter]
And so, you maintain this was a consignment deal
and you have a lot to say about the drop in the market.
I mean, that makes sense. It seems like many assets, uh...
It was after COVID, the market went up.
Michael Jordan rookie, graded 10, everybody knows, sold for 400,000.
A year later...
Yeah, about 120,000.
[Judge Acker] That's crazy.
I think, that since what is such a big part of your defense
is how the market has declined,
I'd like to learn a little more about that.
We very fortunately have an expert who can speak to these issues.
Cassandra, would you bring in the expert, please?
[announcer] Coming up on Tribunal Justice.
How do you make money?
How many cards do you flip in a year and how much money do you make?
Like what's your annual income?
[dramatic musical sting]
[theme music plays]
[announcer] Jeffrey Taylor is suing Brian McLain for $10,000.
Jeffrey claims Brian defaulted on payments owed on basketball cards
worth over $20,000.
Brian claims the card values plummeted
and that Jeffrey never had a payment deadline.
Sir, could you please state your name for the record?
So my name is Mitchell Guttenberg.
I own a store called The Bullpen Sports Cards
in Los Angeles and El Segundo.
I've been doing this for almost 30 years.
[Judge Acker] When you say, "been doing this," what is this?
Cards, buying, selling trading cards.
[Judge Acker] How does one determine that the Steph Curry card is worth $800?
[Mitchell] Um, so cards are based on basically the want.
And rookie cards will be the most valuable cards out of the group.
It's usually on--based on rarity.
[Judge Acker] Can you speak then in the last two years
between 2021 and right now
in terms of the value of these basketball cards?
Most everything has gotten down a lot.
Post-COVID, uh, it started to become a very big--
more and more people came in with money, investment money, crypto money.
Easiest way I can explain this, and this is--
it's one of the things I've always said.
Um, after Thanksgiving dinner about 6:00
and you can't move because you've eaten so much food,
and that's where the market was at in '21 or '20.
And then you kinda settle down, and you sit down, and 8:00, 9:00,
everything is digested.
That's when the bubble started coming down
because in '20 and '21,
cards were 200%, 300% higher than what they should be.
[Judge Acker] People were sitting around at home looking for things...
- Uh-hmm. - [Judge Acker] ... to do perhaps.
- Correct. - Thank you, sir. You can have a seat.
So that's your position.
The values have dropped
- so precipitously... - [Brian] Yeah.
... that you just don't owe him the money.
But I was still paying him.
And if he would look at the cards
that he said he gave me one by one and evaluate them,
you would see what I'm saying is,
he said 11,000, he would probably say 7,000.
[Judge Acker] But sir, what's also confusing--
I'm being kind. I'm not confused at all.
- [Brian] I know, um... - It's concerning
because the gravamen of this transaction
was not as I see it a consignment transaction
because in your text messages to him, you repeatedly say,
"I'm gonna sell the Bitcoin.
- I'm waiting for a wire." - Right.
[Judge Acker] "I'm waiting on my tenants to pay me."
Because I wanted to keep our relationship going, yeah.
"I'm waiting on my tenants to pay me."
- Not "I don't owe you this..." - [Brian] Right.
... "because the card didn't sell for this."
- Right. - [Judge Acker] What you say to him is,
- "I will pay you when I get paid." - Right.
So all of that was very interesting and educational for me.
I wanted to make sure I understood the parameters of your defense.
- Uh-hmm. - [Judge Acker] But I just don't buy it.
Judge DiMango.
So I just wanna let you know that when I was a young girl,
I did collect baseball cards.
I used to flip them, I would trade them.
- I knew who--I'm not even gonna tell you. - Put them in your bike spokes?
I'm not even gonna tell you who the players were
because then that would date me, so I'm not gonna do that.
- I'm used... - Ty Cobb?
[laughter]
Ignore him. So I used to put them in a breadbox.
You know, years ago in the cabinets they had that breadbox
and I put 'em in there.
And then when we moved, my mother looked at all those cards...
- [Jeffrey] Uh-hmm. - ... that I had so wisely kept,
uh, the Mantle cards, things like that,
- and threw them out. - Oh, God.
So, I would not be up on this bench had I had those
- 'cause I'd be rich. - Yeah, 10 million, right?
- [Judge DiMango] Which I now am not. - The Mantle '52...
- Yeah. On the Mantle, yeah. - ... sold for 10 million, so.
- No, don't tell me these things. - [laughter]
Mantle, Maris, all of those cards.
- [Brian] Willie Mays, yeah. - Anyway, I can't.
I can't--I can't even say it right.
Every time my mother, I go, "I can't believe I threw them out."
How do you make money? Or how many cards do you flip in a year?
And how much money do you make? Like what's your annual income?
Um, probably around 10,000, 11,000.
It's not what I do professionally.
It's something I do as a side hustle, and because I enjoy collecting some...
You're hustling and only making 10,000.
- That doesn't sound... - Yeah, I mean, it's because I enjoy...
- What's about you? - ... I enjoy collecting.
You know, you go to shows, it's a very small community, tight-knit,
you know people, which is nice, you know?
It's very nice. And what about you,
- how much do you make? - Same thing. I like Kobe--
15,000, 20,000, buyin' and sellin'.
- [Judge DiMango] Okay. - I mean, it's not a lot.
[Judge DiMango] Now, I'm gonna tell you what kind of confused me.
You have a Curry card, $800.
You give it to him,
you're charging him at that moment $800 for that card.
You're gonna sell it 'cause you wanna make some money.
- Right. - [Judge DiMango] You read the market.
The way people read the stock market, you read the card market.
Your view perhaps is, in two weeks it'll go up.
- You could be mistaken, it goes down. - [Brian] Uh-hmm.
But he still wants his $800.
So he doesn't really care that it goes down.
- Would that be correct? - Yeah. It's like buying a house in 2005
and then when 2009, it's not worth the same, saying,
"Well, I'm only gonna pay you what it's worth now."
All the analogies. And really what you're doing,
in my view, Mr. McLain,
is you are really trying to sell those cards
that you're buying from him.
So in your own mind, it's kinda like a consignment deal
because you wanna pay him with the money you get
- from those cards. - I was going...
[Judge DiMango] As opposed to what he wants,
which is, "Here's the card, $800, give me my $800."
Which is why he's standing here today.
- Would that be correct, sir? - Correct.
[Judge DiMango] He makes sense to me.
There's a thing in the law called detrimental reliance,
and that means that an individual gets involved
in an agreement or a contract
and he relies on the terms of then conditions of that deal
at some point to his detriment,
which is what you've done here.
He made a deal with you to sell you X number of cards at X dollars.
He might have been generous enough to let you take some time to pay,
but not some time to pay at a changed value.
Time to pay what he agreed to sell you those cards at.
- I'm done. - [Judge Levy] Yeah. Thank you.
I wanna go back to where I left off before I passed it over to Judge Acker
'cause I wasn't clear.
On July 12th is when you both agree there was a new balance owed
by you to him of 49,000.
And then between July 19th and August 1st,
multiple texts going back and forth,
plaintiff to you, "Where's my money?"
Your excuse is, "My broker says my stock transaction didn't clear yet."
Next day, "Where's my money?"
Another excuse.
And on August 2nd, there's a text,
plaintiff demanding payment or the cards back,
and you just ghost him.
You don't respond.
And then he sees you selling the cards
- on eBay, right? - Correct.
At the same time he's receiving money from me.
[Judge Levy] Hold on. I don't care about that.
And instead of giving him the cards back
and you just saying, "Hey, listen, market value went down, screw it.
I'm gonna cut my losses.
I paid you a bunch of money so far, here's what you get."
You didn't do that. You kept the cards.
I kept two cards 'cause five were sold.
He was given that money.
- [Judge Levy] I--well... - [Brian] I kept two.
- [Judge Levy] Well, uh, hold on. - [Brian] I then offered him...
- Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. - ... I then offered him
- an $8,000 collection... - [Judge Levy] No, no, no.
- ... which he refused. - [Judge Levy] Hold...
And then I offered him a $20,000 collection.
[Judge Levy] Hold on. There came a time where you, Mr. McLain,
offer him 1,800 substituted cards
valued by you at $20,000
to make good on a portion of your $49,000 owed
- that we had just agreed to, July 12th. - We're trying to do the deal.
So you're trying to give him substituted cards.
You took those cards and you took them for value of $20,000
because that's how we got to an eventual number...
- Number that was much lower. - [Judge Levy] ... of what?
Of $26,500.
Even though you gave him major stars
- and you pretty much got snicklefritz? - A hundred percent, yes.
[Judge Levy] So you know it's gonna be a heck of a lot easier
to sell the major stars, correct,
than it is minor stars or commons, right?
Snicklefritz.
[announcer] Coming up on Tribunal Justice.
He's gettin' kinda nervous, Mr. McLain, where he's never gonna get his money.
And that's when you do what?
[dramatic musical sting]
[theme music plays]
[announcer] Jeffrey Taylor is suing Brian McLain for $10,000
still owed on basketball trading cards.
But Brian claims Jeffrey wouldn't take the cards back
and isn't giving him time to sell them.
So, you're just trying to get something from him
'cause at this point, you're like, "He's ghosting me.
I don't think I'm gonna get anything back."
I'm trying to get cordial because I don't wanna piss him off.
I wanna make sure I get paid.
And so he's getting kinda nervous, Mr. McLain,
and so there comes a time where he figures
it's time to fish or cut bait
and he's gotta get you to commit to a certain number
that you can't dance around or he's never gonna get his money.
And that's when you do what?
I create a promissory note
- with the name of the defendant. - [Judge Levy] A promissory note.
26,500, a 10% interest
payable in seven monthly payments of $4,417.
The first payment due February of 2022,
the last payment of August of 2022, right?
- Correct. - [Judge Levy] Perfect.
So now, everything that we've been going over,
what the value is, what this is, 16 cards, 18 cards, seven cards,
none of that means a hill of beans anymore 'cause now we have a promissory note,
both of your signatures, January 20th, 2022.
Now, how much did he pay?
He made one payment of $4,417 on the first month.
It was actually, according to your complaint,
it was April 1st and it was $5,000.
And then you said after that payment,
- he paid you a total of $6,800? - Correct.
- [Judge Levy] True or false? - True.
So why don't you pay him the rest?
And I still have two of the cards.
I don't care whether you have two of the cards.
He don't want the cards anymore. He has a promissory note.
He wants his money. Why didn't you give it to him?
Because I'm still sitting on the two cards that are not sellable.
[Judge Levy] I'm done.
We are going to retire to deliberate at this time.
- Thank you, both. - Court is now in recess.
Parties may exit.
[dramatic musical sting]
Well, once again, we got to the truth.
Took a little while.
We did. You had Mr. Taylor so nervous. [laughs]
- Oh, I know and... - Poor guy. I thought he was gonna cry.
Well, in all--in all fairness, you know, we got to the truth
as far as what is ultimately I believe owed.
I think we'll have an agreement on it.
But there was no check, 'cause that would've showed bad faith
on the part of the defendant.
He would've wanted us to believe that there was bad faith
and he had proof of that.
So by him not producing it, it's clear that it never existed.
Putting all that aside, that promissory note was genius.
He knew he was getting jerked around by the defendant.
So he was smart enough to lay out in January of 2022
what the understanding was between the two as to what was owed.
So it was a $26,500 promissory note,
$5,000 was paid...
- Right. - ... $6,800 was paid.
- That leaves $14,700 that he's owed. - Right.
We're capped here jurisdictionally at 10,000.
And I believe that that is what the plaintiff is entitled to
- from the defendant. - I do too.
- Very easy for me. - [Judge DiMango] Yeah.
And what the defendant was doing is kind of being a little sneaky
- or a lot sneaky that... - [Judge Levy] A lot sneaky.
Trying to get his money from everywhere,
including selling the cards first before he was paying over.
So the bottom line is,
he could sell him at 50 million at this point.
He's not gonna give that over to the plaintiff if that changes.
- I didn't hear him say... - Right. What a great point.
- "When the market"... - If the market rises...
- Well, I meant to ask him that. - That would've...
- I was gonna say, "If the market... - [Judge Acker] That's true.
... goes up, were you gonna be willing to give him more money
than you both agreed to?"
That's why it came out kinda simple 'cause I was confused as well at first.
I didn't know what was going on.
But then when I realized that was the real issue,
"I'm selling these to you for X, you are gonna pay me X.
Whether you sell 'em for Y or Z, I don't care.
But you're gonna give me my money."
And I think now we're gonna give it to him.
- Let's do it. - That's it.
- Done. - Thank you.
[dramatic musical sting]
Parties are reminded that court is back in session.
You're still under oath.
You know, Mr. McLain, you say that this was a consignment deal.
There was no evidence it was a consignment deal at all.
It was a done deal.
The terms were clear, first 56,000, then 51,500, then 49,000.
It was clear. Nothing about consignment.
He wants to get something
'cause he don't trust you as far as he can throw you
and he knows he's gotta get something before you're in the wind.
And what Judge DiMango said was, "What if the prices actually went up?
That card that he said was only worth $400.
Now it's worth $4,000."
You think he's giving you 2,000?
- [chuckles] - Hell no.
And it's a shame 'cause he did you right.
Quite frankly, I still don't understand about the check,
but I don't care about that.
You were smart 'cause you knew enough to know
that he was never gonna be honest with you
and you had to commit him to a number.
So, that promissory note was $26,500.
We have evidence that he paid you back 5,000 and then $6,800.
So, $14,700, that's what he owes you.
But the jurisdictional maximum in this jurisdiction is 10,000.
Unanimous decision of this court, he owes you $10,000.
- Be a better person. - [gavel bangs]
- Thank you. - [Cassandra] This case has concluded.
Parties are excused.
[theme music plays]
We had done several deals, you know, between the two of us.
And, uh, the market value just killed me.
I wasn't gonna get my money
and that if I kept on this path, um, I was just gonna stress myself out.
I think we could put it behind us. I mean, you know...
Character is everything in this game.
Whether we do more deals or not, I don't know.
I mean, I have cards, he has cards, so.
Absolutely not.
[announcer] Have you been scammed?
Let the majority rule in your favor on Tribunal Justice.
Find us on social media.
["Ride of the Valkyries" plays]