Operation Bullpen

Last updated

Operation Bullpen was an FBI investigation into forged celebrity autographs and sports memorabilia that ran from 1999 until 2006. The investigation uncovered $100 million worth of fraud that occurred in the United States.

Contents

Background

In the 1990s, Operation Foulball in San Diego began uncovering widespread forgeries of baseball memorabilia.

After the FBI became aware that a large forgery ring was operating, they launched a joint investigation with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). [1]

Wayne Bray, a memorabilia shop owner, met master forger Gregory Marino in 1994. The two became friends, and went into business selling forged Mickey Mantle autographs among other items. [2] A large number of the forgeries were made by Marino, [3] who could perfectly copy signatures on sight and worked 15 hours a day to produce forgeries. Marino estimated that he made over a million forgeries during their operation. [2] They went into business with former deputy sheriff, Stan Fitzgerald, a well known distributor of memorabilia on the East Coast. [2] [4] Over time, their forgery ring grew to include 20 individuals including several members of Marino's family. [2] Marino's father produced lithograph paintings of athletes, which sold for much higher sums once Gregory Marino had added forged signatures to them. [5] Another notable figure was John Olson, who forged around 10,000 autographs, the majority of which were Muhammad Ali. [6]

The forgers used a variety of methods to make their memorabilia appear authentic, including buying old books to use the aged paper inside for autographs, [2] aging baseballs in shellac, storing memorabilia in bags of dog food to make them smell old, and using antique ink and pens to sign them. [7] They made their businesses appear more legitimate by taking out ads on home shopping networks and in official trade publications. [8]

Phase 1

The FBI began a national investigation into forgeries of sports memorabilia in October 1999. In April 2000, the FBI made an announcement about the operation, with investigators estimating that anywhere from 50% to 90% of memorabilia in the industry was fake. [9] [10] The FBI began an undercover operation through an agent posing as a forgery distributor in Asia. [3] This undercover distributor operated through a fake company called the Nihon Trading Company. [11]

In addition to tracking down forgers and distributors, the FBI also targeted authenticators who knowingly authenticated forged memorabilia for the ring. [12] Most memorabilia at the time was authenticated by Donald Frangipani, an FBI authentication expert. Frangipani was later used as an expert witness in the trials, despite having personally worked with the defendants. [13]

During the investigation, it was discovered that forged memorabilia was being sold through trade publications, shopping channels and even retail stores. [11] In one official team store, an estimated 75 percent of autographs purported to be from MLB players and other personnel were fake. Among these forgeries were supposed autographs by Mickey Mantle, a Babe Ruth underwear box, as well as a baseball with a forged signature from the Catholic saint Mother Teresa. [14]

On October 13, 1999, the FBI conducted a massive raid across five states. It was the biggest single-day takedown in FBI history, resulting in the confiscation of around $10 million in forged memorabilia, [8] and $500,000 in cash. [1] The forged items included "cut" autographs with the forged signatures of individuals like deceased US presidents Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. [11]

In 2000, five members of the Marino family and 20 other individuals pled guilty to charges related to the forgery ring. [15] Gregory Marino was sentenced to almost three and a half years in prison. [3]

Phase 2

Phase 2 of Operation Bullpen began in 2002 and included forgeries which were sold online. During this phase, the FBI conducted 18 searches in 12 states. [11]

Phase 3

The FBI defaced forged signatures on the equipment and memorabilia they confiscated during the investigation, and donated them to children's organizations and other groups. [16]

The operation was finally ended in 2005, after shutting down 18 forgery rings and confiscating $15 million worth of fake memorabilia. [6] Ultimately, over 60 convictions were made due to the investigation. [17]

Legacy

After the results of the investigation came to light, Major League Baseball launched the MLB Authentication Program to ensure the integrity of official memorabilia and to preserve historical records. Other leagues such as the National Football League, National Hockey League and National Basketball Association launched smaller scale efforts at identifying fakes. [10]

In 2017, Gregory Marino was interviewed for The Counterfeiter, [18] a part of ESPN's 30 for 30 series of documentary films. [3]

Related Research Articles

A signature is a handwritten depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and intent. The writer of a signature is a signatory or signer. Similar to a handwritten signature, a signature work describes the work as readily identifying its creator. A signature may be confused with an autograph, which is chiefly an artistic signature. This can lead to confusion when people have both an autograph and signature and as such some people in the public eye keep their signatures private whilst fully publishing their autograph.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Authentication</span> Act of proving an assertion

Authentication is the act of proving an assertion, such as the identity of a computer system user. In contrast with identification, the act of indicating a person or thing's identity, authentication is the process of verifying that identity. It might involve validating personal identity documents, verifying the authenticity of a website with a digital certificate, determining the age of an artifact by carbon dating, or ensuring that a product or document is not counterfeit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hitler Diaries</span> Forged journals purportedly by Adolf Hitler

The Hitler Diaries were a series of sixty volumes of journals purportedly written by Adolf Hitler, but forged by Konrad Kujau between 1981 and 1983. The diaries were purchased in 1983 for 9.3 million Deutsche Marks by the West German news magazine Stern, which sold serialisation rights to several news organisations. One of the publications involved was The Sunday Times, who asked their independent director, the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, to authenticate the diaries; he did so, pronouncing them genuine. At the press conference to announce the publication, Trevor-Roper announced that on reflection he had changed his mind, and other historians also raised questions concerning their validity. Rigorous forensic analysis, which had not been performed previously, quickly confirmed that the diaries were fakes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Autograph collecting</span> Practice of collecting autographs of famous persons

Autograph collecting is the practice of collecting autographs of famous persons. Some of the most popular categories of autograph subjects are politicians, military soldiers, athletes, movie stars, artists, social and religious leaders, scientists, astronauts, and authors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sports memorabilia</span> Collectables associated with sports

Sports memorabilia refers to collectables associated with sports, including equipment, trophies, sports cards, autographs, photographs, etc.

Mark William Hofmann is an American counterfeiter, forger, and convicted murderer. Widely regarded as one of the most accomplished forgers in history, Hofmann is especially noted for his creation of fake documents related to the history of the Latter Day Saint movement. When his schemes began to unravel, he constructed bombs to murder three people in Salt Lake City, Utah. The first two bombs killed two people on October 15, 1985. On the following day, a third bomb exploded in Hofmann's car. He was arrested for the bombings three months later, and in 1987 pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder, one count of theft by deception and one count of fraud.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Konrad Kujau</span> German illustrator and forger (1938–2000)

Konrad Paul Kujau was a German illustrator and forger. He became famous in 1983 as the creator of the so-called Hitler Diaries, for which he received DM 2.5 million from a journalist, Gerd Heidemann, who in turn sold it for DM 9.3 million to the magazine Stern, resulting in a net profit of DM 6.8 million for Heidemann. The forgery resulted in a four-and-half-year prison sentence for Kujau.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Art forgery</span> Creation and trade of falsely credited art

Art forgery is the creation and sale of works of art which are falsely credited to other, usually more famous artists. Art forgery can be extremely lucrative, but modern dating and analysis techniques have made the identification of forged artwork much simpler.

Ely Sakhai is an American art dealer and civil engineer who owned Manhattan art galleries The Art Collection and Exclusive Art. He was later charged and convicted for selling forged art and was sentenced to 41 months in federal prison for fraud. After his release he continued to operate The Art Collection in Great Neck, New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jean de Sperati</span> Italian stamp forger (1884–1957)

Giovanni (Jean) de Sperati was an Italian stamp forger. Robson Lowe considered him an artist and even professional stamp authenticators of his time attested to the genuineness of his work. Sperati created what he called a Livre d'Or which he boasted of in his autobiography and which contained 239 favourable opinions as to the genuineness of his forgeries from numerous experts, including Dr. Edward Diena and the Royal Philatelic Society London.

<i>How to Steal a Million</i> 1966 film by William Wyler

How to Steal a Million is a 1966 American heist comedy film directed by William Wyler and starring Audrey Hepburn, Peter O'Toole, Eli Wallach, Hugh Griffith, and Charles Boyer. The film is set and was filmed in Paris, though the characters speak entirely in English. Hepburn's clothes were designed by Givenchy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Identity document forgery</span> Fake IDs and their production

Identity document forgery is the process by which identity documents issued by governing bodies are copied and/or modified by persons not authorized to create such documents or engage in such modifications, for the purpose of deceiving those who would view the documents about the identity or status of the bearer. The term also encompasses the activity of acquiring identity documents from legitimate bodies by falsifying the required supporting documentation in order to create the desired identity.

Barry Halper was an extensive collector of baseball memorabilia who had been a limited partner owning about 1% of the New York Yankees. During the auction of Halper's collection, Sotheby's Auction House called it the "World Series of Sports Auctions."

An insert card is a card that is randomly inserted into packs of a sports card offering. These insert cards are not part of the regular numbering system of a set of sports cards and they tend to have a unique design. Another term for insert cards is chase cards. Insert cards either have their own numbering system. Insert cards are found less frequently than base cards. Autographed cards, memorabilia cards and parallel cards are also classified as insert cards. Insert cards are randomly inserted into packs at a specific ratio. A 1:24 ratio specifies that on average one of every 24 packs will contain a card from that insert set.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beckett Media</span>

Beckett Media is a firm dedicated to covering the sports card, comic book grading, collectibles, and sports memorabilia sectors. Established in 1984 by statistician Dr. James Beckett, it was originally known as Beckett Publications.

The following outline is provided as an overview and topical guide to forgery:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Knoedler</span> Defunct New York City art dealership

M. Knoedler & Co. was an art dealership in New York City founded in 1846. When it closed in 2011, amid lawsuits for fraud, it was one of the oldest commercial art galleries in the US, having been in operation for 165 years.

John Olson is a forger associated with the FBI's Operation Bullpen investigation. He pled guilty to forging thousands of Muhammad Ali and various other autographs. The FBI gathered information on the ring during a previous sting known as operation FOUL BALL. They launched the investigation that would ultimately culminate with a bust on October 13, 1999. They took down the biggest forgery ring in sports memorabilia history. Chuck Wepner, a former opponent of Ali and tough man boxer from Bayonne, New Jersey, would vouch for the autographs and John Olson and others would sign the items.

Leonore Carol "Lee" Israel was an American author known for committing literary forgery. Her 2008 confessional autobiography Can You Ever Forgive Me? was adapted into the 2018 film of the same name starring Melissa McCarthy as Israel.

The Major League Baseball Authentication Program, or MLB Authentication Program, is a program run by Major League Baseball Properties, the product licensing arm of Major League Baseball, to guarantee the authenticity of baseball merchandise and memorabilia. The centerpiece of the system is a tamper-resistant security tape sticker with an embedded hologram. Each sticker carries a unique alphanumeric code. The sticker is affixed to all game-used merchandise and memorabilia, while information about the item is entered into a computer database. Between 500,000 and 600,000 items are authenticated each season.

References

  1. 1 2 "Babe Ruth Baseballs". Federal Bureau of Investigation. Retrieved 2023-02-15.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 "Sports, scam'n' forgery sells". East Bay Times. 2006-10-19. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "ESPN 30 for 30 Film Focuses on Operation Bullpen Forger". Sports Collectors Daily. 2017-04-19. Retrieved 2023-02-08.
  4. ↑ admin. "Operation Bullpen author warns of new forgery tricks | Tuff Stuff" . Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  5. ↑ says, Operation Bullpen's Forgers Always Gave Collectors What They Wanted (2013-03-08). "The Operation Bullpen Forgeries That Most Collectors Will Never Buy". Sports Collectors Daily. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  6. 1 2 Bartholomew, Rafe. "The Greatest Fakes: Inside the world of forged Muhammad Ali autographs". The Athletic. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  7. ↑ "The Journal of Antiques and Collectibles | The Social Platform for Antiquers, Collectors, and Enthusiasts". 2020-05-31. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  8. 1 2 Bartsch, Tom (October 23, 2014). "Operation Bullpen Endures, Public Fascination Continues".
  9. ↑ Baccellieri, Emma (September 6, 2021). "Keep Your Eye on the Balls: How MLB Squashed its Fake-Memorabilia Problem". Sports Insider.
  10. 1 2 "The Secret Agents at Every Major League Baseball Game". Esquire. 2015-05-07. Retrieved 2023-03-02.
  11. 1 2 3 4 Hendley, Nate (2016-09-06). The Big Con: Great Hoaxes, Frauds, Grifts, and Swindles in American History: Great Hoaxes, Frauds, Grifts, and Swindles in American History. ABC-CLIO. ISBN   978-1-61069-586-2.
  12. ↑ says, Author Kevin Nelson to Take Your Questions About Operation Bullpen (2013-03-15). "Phony Autograph Authenticators and Fake COAs Mar Collecting Hobby". Sports Collectors Daily. Retrieved 2023-02-21.{{cite web}}: |first= has generic name (help)
  13. ↑ Riccio, Thomas J. (2008). Busted!: The Inside Story of the World of Sports Memorabilia, O.J. Simpson, and the Vegas Arrests. Phoenix Books, Inc. p. 123. ISBN   978-1-59777-587-8.
  14. ↑ "The Babe Ruth Underpants Box Forgery". Sports Collectors Daily. 2013-03-04. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  15. ↑ "5 Plead Guilty in Fake Souvenir Ring". AP NEWS. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  16. ↑ "Operation Bullpen Overview". FBI. Retrieved 2023-03-02.
  17. ↑ "Operation Bullpen: Fake Autographs Still Out There in Marketplace". Sports Collectors Daily. 2013-03-01. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
  18. ↑ Nelson, Kevin. "Director of 'The Countefeiter' talks about Greg Marino and the 1998 home run chase".
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.