Oklahoma district attorney auctioning counterfeiter's classi

Can only pray for the day some of the mopar dogs get bit.

https://www.foxnews.com/auto/oklahoma-auctioning-counterfeiters-ford-mustangs

A six-pack of classic Ford Mustangs is being auctioned in Oklahoma, but buyers should definitely beware.

(Proxibid)

The cars were seized by the Pottawatomie County (Oklahoma) District Attorney’s office during an investigation into a car cloning operation run by a lawyer, Kermit Milburn, who committed suicide in 2016 while facing accusations he tried to pass off counterfeit Shelby Mustangs with phony Vehicle Identification Numbers (VINs) as authentic at a car auction in Indianapolis.

(Proxibid)

Turning run of the mill cars like Mustangs into "clones" of valuable models is a relatively common practice and typically legal as long as a seller doesn't misrepresent them. For instance, one of the long-lost Ford Mustangs used in the making of the Steve McQueen film "Bullitt" was discovered in a junkyard by a custom car builder looking for a donor vehicle to turn into a replica of the "Eleanor" Mustang from "Gone in 60 Seconds."

(Proxibid)

According to News 9, the cars are from Milburn’s personal collection and have been in storage ever since. They’re now being auctioned online, with most of the proceeds earmarked for the attorney’s office and county jail.

(Proxibid)

The cars include what appear to be two 1970 Mustang Boss 302s, a 1970 red Shelby GT500 Convertible, an unfinished 1970 Shelby GT500 that’s either mid-restoration or mid-transformation, a 1970 Mustang Convertible that hasn’t had any work done on it yet and a 2006 Mustang GT modified with some Shelby-style parts.

(Proxibid)

District Attorney Allan Grubb said they believe at least some of the cars may be authentic, but can’t vouch for their provenance and have issued new state titles and VINs, which experts say can lower their value by putting a cloud over them, even if they turn out to be the real deal.

(Proxibid)

The auction house recommends that bidders perform their own inspections. The odometer in the red Shelby, for instance, is set to zero, which could mean it doesn’t have its original engine or isn’t a Shelby at all. If it is real, it could be worth well over $100,000, while the Boss 302s are potentially valued at $50,000 or more.

The online auction runs through February 8.

They arrest him because they were not real but, glad to sell them to highest bidder with goofy paperwork .. cops got it figured out

"with most of the proceeds earmarked for the attorney’s office and county jail."



The accused's suicide wasn't in the Metropolitan Correctional Center by any chance?

I posted the article simply to show a vin tamperer got nailed as they should be. It only takes one bad car and they took them all, they need to do more like that. Myself I dont care what they do then, crush or sell but in this case its no different then anything recovered or seized, it gets sold. New vins and a title.

Looks like the DA office is as unscrupulous as the counterfeiter.

I think a case can be made to confiscate the fake car, but to take the whole shebang without(?) due process seems draconian to me, and that decision is made under the taint it profits the accusing party, sure is a slippery slope.

Presumably the new DMV VIN & Title mean that they performed due diligence to be certain the cars weren't stolen or otherwise subject to legal issues.
Ford VINs of that era would call out engine & trans IIRC, so a regular Mustang & a Boss 302 couldn't have the same codes on their VIN tag.
Ford VINs are also stamped in 2 or 3 areas including the tag, which is attached to the driver's door.
Whether all that was switched around is the big question, and it's probably unanswerable without sanding down the VIN locations & verifying factory door tag attachment.
At least the DMV VIN makes it obvious that the cars have unsavory history.
IIRC, there was a guy who faked an LS6 Chevelle a few years back, got sued & lost his [censored], but I don't know whether the VIN was addressed or if there was jail time.
Given the values/prices for E-bodies, the guys faking them are playing with fire, yet those cars get exposed here frequently.

That red convertible looks like the car I saw a picture of in a news story about a guy the US Marshalls busted for fraud or some such and had his car collection confiscated. It was all going to auction. Don't recall names or places of course.

Sounds like the one who built them wasnt allowed to sell them .
But yet johnny laws office can

if they are going to sell cheap buy one and drive it every day in the rust belt states.

in my opinion after reading the first post you are confusing the facts, and making a case where 2 different people, 1 is the counterfeiter and the other is johnny law. are doing EXACTLY the same thing and only 1 of them doing it is legal.

yes they are both selling cars that can be licenses and driven on public highways. this is where the similarities end. how they are representing them is the difference.

the COUNTERFEITER was representing the cars as REAL cars with LEGITIMATE vin #'s worth the maximum possible value he could get for them..

JOHNNY LAW is representing the cars as DAMAGED goods with NON FACTORY vin tags. he is also representing the cars as POSSIBLE ORIGINAL cars but they will be forever be tainted as POSSIBLE NON ORIGINAL FAKE cars. because of this they will never be worth as much as a original car with clean paperwork.


in my opinion there is a light years difference between the 2 scenarios.

On every point you just made. One is fraud, the other isn't. There is a difference.

Absolutely, if one looks at it without a bias. There is no misrepresentation- the prospective buyers have been informed on the dubious history of the cars, and can decide what value they will place on such.

The government office is legally bound to seize and through Due Process, sell goods that are either part of a crime or have a linkage to it. Where the proceeds go, is also set by statute. Two government operations will have some reimbursement for the tax dollars spent for the crimes this guy committed. It is unlikely the corrections center will have a windfall of money to splurge on. The fiscal body of the government will pull money slated in their operating budget- and spend the auction money somewhere else. THAT is what needs to be watched.

"The government office is legally bound to seize and through Due Process, sell goods that are either part of a crime or have a linkage to it. Where the proceeds go, is also set by statute."

So who wrote the statue?

Who here approved/voted for the those in enforcing the "statute" to get/reap the rewards from their interpretation of the statue?

Those that write/enforce the law are not immune from self serving "bias".

Its hard to make a believable case of "due process" here when the accused is deceased before trial.

My whole position on the matter would be mitigated if say for instance the auction proceeds were divided fairly with those proven to be previously harmed financially by the accused actions, or anything else that did not directly benefit the enforcers.

Well, legislatures make statutes in the State Capitol. I can't speak for that State, but in all likelihood the mechanism is similar in each state.

How can the be "due process" on a deceased person? Easy, before taking property following the procedure to ensure 4th amendment concerns were addressed that's due process.

There is a lot of that case not mentioned in the article, but making an assumption that to get to the point that property is being sold at a forfeiture auction was done without all those issues taking place is jumping to a lot of conclusions with nothing to support the position.

Not liking something doesn't make that "something" immoral or illegal. It's a good thing to have the fruits of a crime taken from a criminal, and the taxpayers getting a little less burden. Too many times these white collar crimes are never resolved well. I came to despise construction fraud people as much as child molesters.