Brandon Cifani is engaged in fraud

[kirchh]

Mr. Brandon Cifani is engaged in fraud, in my opinion.

Brandon Cifani is a minor and a high school student. His email address is brandon15926@gmail.com; his FPGeeks user name is Brando090, his fountainpennetwork username is Brando090 (banned), his fountainpenboard username is Brando090, he has used cifani090 on other boards such as Head-Fi.org (banned), his former eBay IDs were “Brando090” (banned) and “Branny090” (banned), and his current eBay ID is “penmaney”.

Brandon Cifani has a long history of fraudulent, dishonest, and deceitful behavior:

- Lying about his age when inquiring about obtaining a firearm

- Lying about the price he paid for a book when offering it for resale

- Lying about his age when registering for an eBay account (three times). He has admitted this lie: “The reason im not on ebay is really not any of your business, and is related to me not being old enough (18)”

- Lying about no longer being on eBay and about no longer buying items there while actively buying pens and other items on eBay

- Violating PayPal terms of service by lying about his age

- Winning items on eBay and refusing to pay for them (e.g. this group of Vacumatics which was won by user "penmaney" according to the seller)

- Lying about the source of items he “bought” (see above)

- Lying about owning certain pens and engaging in negotiations to sell or trade those pens

A previous post here included a survey of some other of Mr. Cifani’s activities.

Brandon Cifani’s latest and perhaps most serious fraud concerns the offering for sale of very expensive pens that he does not possess nor own. Here is a timeline of the events surrounding this fraud:

On May 11 of this year, Brandon Cifani sent me an email asking,

“Do you still have the Waterman combo for sale?
--
Best Regards,
Brandon”

This was an apparent reference to an old For Sale listing I had posted. I replied, stating that I still owned the pen to which he referred. He answered in part,

“Could you please send me photos of that one, and silver and gold pens your [sic] looking to sell. English, German, French, and Italian pens along with the normal Waterman silver and taper pens.”

I replied to Mr. Cifani, but I did not send a direct email. Instead, I sent my response through eBay to User ID “penmaney” as I suspected that was Mr. Cifani’s eBay handle. I asked Mr. Cifani what his budget was. He replied back through eBay from user “penmaney” and stated that his budget was “unlimited.” This confirmed that Brandon Cifani’s eBay userID was “penmaney”.

I sent Mr. Cifani a photo of the Waterman combo, and I also sent a photo of some of my early overlay pens. Knowing Mr. Cifani’s history of unethical activities, in order to protect myself I subtly watermarked my name in the image of the overlays, and I included a comment in the EXIF data in the image file stating that I owned the pens in the image and that Mr. Cifani did not. On a hunch, I also sent a copy of the image to George Rimakis, as I know he has an interest in early Waterman pens and in overlays in particular, and the image included several early Waterman overlays. I warned George that if he were offered any of these items, a fraud was being perpetrated.

Here is the picture I sent to Brandon Cifani:



Mr. Cifani replied to me on May 13 and said, in part,

“I would be interested in everything. What are the model number [sic] and what are you asking.”

I replied by identifying some of the model numbers, including that of a Waterman taper cap half-overlay – a model 222.

The next day, May 14, George Rimakis contacted me and stated that he had received an email from Mr. Cifani stating that Brandon had some sterling taper cap pens that Mr. Rimakis might be interested in. Brandon then emailed George a picture, with the cover note,

“Here are some of the pens I can trade.”

Mr. Cifani followed that message with a PM to George, in which Brandon stated,

“I sent you some pictures of a recent overseas pen collection that I bought.”

Here is the picture that Brandon Cifani sent to George Rimakis:



The picture that Mr. Cifani sent to Mr. Rimakis of this “overseas pen collection” he had supposedly purchased was instead the very same image I’d sent him of my early overlay pens, complete with watermark (top left) and EXIF data indicating that Mr. Cifani did not own the pens.

To be sure that Brandon did not simply mix up some pictures, and that he was claiming that he both owned and physically possessed the pens in the picture he had sent, George asked him about a few details of the pens, and George also inquired about how the purported “overseas collection” was shipped to Mr. Cifani. Brandon promptly replied,

“The Waterman's [sic] on the left are about 5 3/4 inches long, while one being just lightly longer. The beautiful Moore overlay pen I was lucky to acquire a short time ago seems to have the cursive initials 'AG' or 'AC'. While I'm open to trades, I'm reluctant to let the Watermans go, and cash is king for these pens. As for shipping, I was lucky enough to get the package personally shipped with a secured delivery which was quite expensive, but well worth it.”

This reply eliminated any possibility that Brandon could claim that he innocently mixed up any pictures, and it also made it clear that he was claiming that he actually had the pens in the picture in his possession.

George then asked Brandon how much he was asking for the group of pens. Mr. Cifani replied,

“For the collection, excluding pens 1,2,3, and 5 I could do $33,300.”

To summarize: Brandon Cifani is attempting to sell, for over $30,000, a group of pens that don’t belong to him.

[George Rimakis’s version of these events is posted here. We collaborated on our posts to ensure accuracy.]