I got ripped off

[tvguy]

 
 I make a lot of money buying and selling and I probably have bragged about some of my scores here.
Well this time I bought a Les Paul for $1800 which is an OK deal but not to buy an re sell.
But I bought it because I wanted it.
I have bought and sold a LOT of guitars and I currently own 25 But none of those guitars I have or have sold were so valuable someone would make a counterfeit.
Anyway by now you guessed it. I paid $1800 for a counterfeit that has zero monetary value. It does play really nice. Nice enough to fool me.
I bought it in March 2021 and only a couple days ago I find out it was fake. I was on a guitar FB group and someone said he thought it might be fake. After doing some research I quickly found out he was right.
Now comes the funny part. I looked at my market place purchase history and found the same add posted by the guy who sold it to me.
So I thought wow I found his ass and because I have GPS timeline on my phone I went back to March and the map showed me his address which I would never have remembered.
So my next thought was how can I prove he sold me the fake? I could have sold the real one and just claimed he sold me a fake
So He had three photos in the ad. One of them was a close up of the head stock and Gibson logo. And the Gibson logo is a giveaway the guitar is not a Gibson. So I had proof I had the exact same guitar he sold me.
Plus a picture of the guitar case in his ad with it's unique scratches and wear was more proof I bought what he sold.
OK so my plan was to message the guy and just say... "hey I bought your Les Paul do you still have that other guitar for sale"
I sent it and no reply. So my next move was to go the the sheriff and then maybe small claims court.
 I went back to his profile page and his last post was about a month ago. To find out more I looked for and found his daughter, his FB friend. She posted a LOT several things a day so I kept scrolling to see if she had talked to him, if he hand moved or what ever.
And then I found out he died one month ago So just to make sure I had the right daughter or whatever I looked for and found his obituary. And with it was a photograph and yes it was him.
OH well, it's only money and you can't win them all

 

[Scrapper]

Excellent investigation!

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

[GPnative]

Perhaps he acquired it thinking it was legit and never knew it was a fake??

[Juniper]

So, what about the Gibson logo lets you know it's fake?

[tvguy]

Perhaps he acquired it thinking it was legit and never knew it was a fake??

 That is what I believe. He would have had to have been a fool to show photos and use his real name.
 I would think if he knew it was fake he would sell it on CL and meet the buyer at some location other than his home.

[tvguy]

So, what about the Gibson logo lets you know it's fake?

 The first thing is the angle of the logo is all wrong. With a real logo the side of the G will line up perfectly with the guitars neck.
There are quite a few other discrepancies.

 

[GPnative]

Perhaps he acquired it thinking it was legit and never knew it was a fake??

 That is what I believe. He would have had to have been a fool to show photos and use his real name.
 I would think if he knew it was fake he would sell it on CL and meet the buyer at some location other than his home.

Of course with all the proof you came up with and if he was still alive, you would still have a case for small claims. if it was me i would of tried to settle, maybe split the difference and each have a story to share about owning a fake.

[tvguy]

Perhaps he acquired it thinking it was legit and never knew it was a fake??

 That is what I believe. He would have had to have been a fool to show photos and use his real name.
 I would think if he knew it was fake he would sell it on CL and meet the buyer at some location other than his home.

Of course with all the proof you came up with and if he was still alive, you would still have a case for small claims. if it was me i would of tried to settle, maybe split the difference and each have a story to share about owning a fake.

Hmm Well you say that  assuming he was honest and didn't know it was fake. And like I said I think that is the case but I don't really know.
But no IMO he owed me the full $1800 Just like if he found out he bought a fake he would have wanted all of his money back from the seller.
I guess what I'm saying is he is 100% responsible no matter what the circumstances were when he bought the guitar.