The saga of Joe Hughes--LONG

I met Joe online at another site about 2 years ago,another milksnake nut. I had taken several week long trips with him in the previous year without major incident(running out of $$ on an extended trip is normal).In March he calls me up to say he is having $$ problems and asks if I want to buy some of his breeders. I agree to send him several thousand for his anerythristic NM milks and HYPO coastals.I further ask him if he wants to make some $$ watching/breeding my collection(Yellow rat morphs,albino chain kings,hypo coastal milks,het anery NM milks,blaze goini,RARE locale E.milks,rare garter morphs,anery Lou milk,etc....).I also give him feeders and $1k for food and pay.

For several months he calls bi-weekly to report in on progress then he stops calling. I know he is like this so I dont worry much.I finish my trip about 8/1 and find one of his freinds #s to call and get in touch by email/cell.He sends me a LIST OF EGGS and due dates!! GOOD GUY! RIght?NO. I go off to Daytona and find a table with similar animals-the guy says he got them at a pet store where Joe used to work.Tony D tells me that the store owner is in Daytona,when confronted about it he says"talk to Joe" and agrees to sell me what he has left at cost. I get back to Mass and immediately drive to Va beach,but not before having a troubling talk with the pet store. It seems that once they knew what they had (and its value)they tell me they "SOLD"even though they had been there for months without selling. The owner steps in and agrees to sell them to me,but NOT the same price.....about 25% over retail. Since I had driven from Mass and the cops taking the report there said that the animals couldnt leave VA because they were now the property of the state--I had to BUY MY OWN snakes back!! What a nice guy?!?!?Back to Joe...
Well as it turns out the whole time Joe is talking to me its nothing but BULL. The date he sold the stuff to the store was 2 weeks after I gave it to him. He sold the whole collection for $700.....after I had given him $1K just to WATCH it!! While I was talking to him about meeting me in Va beach(he never showed up)he proceeded to rip off the girlfriend he was staying with and the band he was singing with(who also filed charges).I also found out that Brian Mason had a very pricey snake lost in this fiasco as well(and encouraged him to preceed leagally). Joe now has warrants out in at least 2-3 states for grand theft and will be picked up one of these days.....I would recommend to anyone trusting anyone to read this because you really dont know who you are dealing with anymore....It can really happen to anyone!Feel free to ask any questions concerning him or this event,thanks,Jeff

How about some names of the pet store(s) that had these animals?

Rick

you actually paid someone to baby sit for your snakes while you were traveling. Am I correct about this? I am a bit confused about Daytona and the eggs explanation. When you got home, did you contact this person to get your snakes back? Where does this vendor in Daytona fit into this, and who was the vendor. ALso, did you loose your collection to this person. Jerry Tresser

I dont know the name of the store,and dont think I would put it on here because they really didnt do anything other than hike up the prices. As far as Joe goes, he is still "missing",there were no eggs,he just strung me along as long as he could....several of us think its a drug problem.It wasnt an obvious one to me unfortunately. J