*** A word to the wise, I was ripped off***

On June 28th I sent $3865 to Jason Vantassel, via Pay Pal for 1 adult albino male boa, 1 adult anerythristic boa female and 1 adult hype boa female.  After many failed attempts to ship successfully through the airlines and then through Airborne and sorry excuses he agreed on Monday 7/8/02 to give my money back prior to anything being shipped or scheduled to ship.  On 7/9/02 I received an email with an airbill number from jason with no details.  Was this a refund check or did he send the animals even though we cancelled it the day before?  I don't know because he would not return my call until Wednesday 7/10/02 a box from airborne shows up and it contains 2 TELEPHONE BOOKS!!!!!!!!!! No snakes and no money.  This is the guy that advertised double hets for snow for about 2 months for $1065 shipped and then later in June for $965 shipped.  If you bought animals from him please email me.  I furiously spoke with him on the day the package arrived and he assured me a full refund would be in my account in 4 days and he "claims" he started the refund on the 9th the night he agreed to refund my money.  No money yet today.  I filed a claim with Pay Pal on the night I received the phone books.  I filed an official Internet Fraud complaint with the FBI and when that complaint gets emailed back to me I will forward it to Kingsnake.com so they can start their investigation.  I have contacted a lawyer and we are going to wait until tonight and then we will contact local authorities in Ft. Lauderdale Florida. (He actually lives in Hollywood FL).  He has since stopped corresponding with me and therefore I have no choice but to pursue this mail fraud felony matter through any legal channels available to me.  If you have any suggestions or have had any contact with Jason I would appreciate an email.  He sold or traded 21 of those offspring to individuals off of Kingsnake so please speak up.  I want to verify what the shipper information says on your airborne packages if you still have them.  His email address is [email protected].  Thanks for your time.  If he returns the money I'll let everyone know.

Sorry about the full name thing.  The long post about being ripped off is by Jeff Nemanius.

WOW... How many people bought his double hets??? You need to get in touch with them and possibly file a class action against him, because if he does not have the adults... then where did the hets come from....??? Good luck and keep us posted.

Jeff - What you are describing has to be one of the most blatant ripoffs I've read on this board.   Are you serious that phone books were mailed to you?  That's not just taking your money, but rubbing your nose in it also.. Please keep us apprised of the situation.   This post really drives home why this board is so important!

Stephen Emerick
Napa Valley Snakes

I am not joking about this, I received 2 Fort Lauderdale phone books, 1 white pages and 1 yellow pages.  I also just received another email from someone that sent him $3k for the same animals and has not received a thing.  This is huge.

Thank you for the heads up, Jeff. I wish you the best of luck in recovering your money. Can you post all known contact info regarding this person? Name, phone number, address, any references he provided. Stuff like that. Keep those phone books handy. Maybe one day a judge can use them to throw at him.

All I can say is this has the makings of a real disaster for many unsuspecting customers of this guys.  If he would have the gall to ship phonebooks to a potential customer, well I'd have to echo Casey's sentiments on whether the hets he was selling were the real thing or not.. This post just went up, and already we're hearing about 7 grand being collected for snakes never delivered!  Pretty disgusting situation...

Stephen Emerick
Napa Valley Snakes

At least he was kind enough to send you the phone books of the local area so you have all the police and government numbers right there.  I really hope you catch this guy.

This guy is defiantley looking at a felony charge!  How far away is he from you?  If not far I would most definatley pay him a visit.  Maybe have the local police in his area go with you.  I hope the best for you.


Franklin Edwards

The shipping of junk in a box is an age old scam used in those cases where the items are being sent C.O.D.  Bricks are often used where the item the 'customer' is expecting should have some weight to it.  UPS or whatever delivers the package and will not allow you to open it until you have paid for it (in most cases).  So you hand the driver the money, he hands you the box, and he drives off while you go to open it up.  Once you find the bricks inside, it is your word against the shipper's as to what was actually in the box.

I had someone send me an expensive camera lens C.O.D. via UPS, and what I did was to pay via VERY small bills.  I had counted it out before hand, and handed the wad of bills to the driver. While the driver was counting out the money, I opened the box right there in case there were a problem so he would be a witness.  Of course, I understand that UPS no longer accepts cash, so I will have to think of something new.  Of course, my UPS driver and I always chew the fat when he delivers stuff, so I'm sure he would be glad to hang around while I opened the box in front of him.

This does bring up an interesting point about this sort of thing.  It may be wise to have a witness present when you open up your boxes.  Otherwise you will really have no proof about what you got in the box.  Jeff, if this guy Jason claims there were actually snakes in that box, do YOU have proof that there were not?  This could get rather messy.

If it's the same guy? He wanted too trade us a trio of the babies for a pair of our het balls.We told him too send first then if everything looked good we would send out the balls.We never heard anything after that it makes you think if he even had them Jon Larson (218 Herps)

Hey, look who's finally posting!  Never did find those IDs, did you, "J & K Larson"/Jesse Underhill?  I think that this guy sounds perfect for you to trade with.   <img src="http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=''>  Then you'd know how it feels to be ripped off...

A good way around your problem (for the next time, unfortunately) is....

The Post Office will accept MO's....the next time, if you know how much you are going to have to pay....get a Money Order "from your bank"!! If everything is not what it's supposed to be....just put a "stop payment" on the MO....It worked for me once, a couple of years ago...

I'm not sure if he wants to get in the middle of this...but, Gary Walsch lives in Hollywood, FL.....maybe he knows him???

Man, I hate people like that!! For that kind of money...I'd drive down there myself, with a couple of "the boys".....good luck ....Neil

Hi folks,
I just e-mailed Jeff to let him know that we will be asking about this guy at the local show tomarrow in Ft. Lauderdale. You all might remember that Ben Seigle and Stickly got some scum-bag nailed at Strickly, so most of the sellers down here won't tolerate crap like this and will probably be willing to help out. We'll keep our ears open!
Craig Clark

Just so everyone knows this is not an isolated incident.  I received a call from a gentleman that bought the same two females that I tried to purchase from Jason, Only he bought them 4 days after I did for $3000 and he hasn't received a thing yet.  He used Postal Money orders. He will be filing a complaint with the FBI as well.  I would be very skeptical if I bought a pair of Double Het for Snows from this guy, because apparently he can't produce the adults for anyone.  Keep your ears open in Ft. Lauderdale this weekend please.  I'd love to hear from you.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (jjunder @ July 12 2002,21:28)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Man you morons still don't get it.

Let see here:::
I have a web cam, 218 herps photos are way better then mine.
Diffenert IP's But on the same Network server that mean two diffenert places Morons

I don't sell snakes anymore I have my own Tattoo Studio here.Plus I don't have time too do it anymore.

I still have animals .So go figure it out I'm not them your all stupid,JJ</td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'>
What's the name of your shop?  I'll be there Monday.

Jesse,
     No one cares what you are doing, but we know you have multiple personalities, maybe if you took your medication on a regular basis they would all stop posting, although this guy we are talking about seems right up your ally... a scum bag!
     Ok back to reality, if this guy cashed a postal money order and then ran off with the money without producing a product, it is a federal offense and he is in some deep poop!
    I hope you get him and get your money back, kkep the phone books and the original boxing and labeling, so if it goes to court you have proof he sent you phone books in HIS area. <img src="http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':0'>  
     Good luck to you.

Torie Miller

Your grammar is astonishing, Jesse. Did you graduate the 4th grade? I feel sorry for the poor bugger who lets you get near them with a needle.  <img src="http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':0'>  <img src="http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':0'>

I was seriously contemplating buying a pair of double het for normal phone books from that guy last week. Thankfully (I think), I drained my bank account on other purchases from honest individuals.

Hi Jeff,


             Email me all the info privately and I will try to help you out.  I am also in Hollywood,Fl. and can't stand scumbags like this as they make it harder for all of us to do business over the net.  I am amazed that something like this happened on this kind of a scale, didn't this guy know people ere not just going to lay down and play dead ?  On the flip side though, and I understand that hindsight is 20/20 .... did you get ant references from this guy and did you check them out ?  If so then you should also post the names of his references that helped him rip you off.  I really feel bad for you and hope that the damage he already did does not turn out to be even worse.  Please email me privately and I will try to help you as much as I can.  I wish I knew about this last night because I went to the local reptile show today and there were a lot of people there that could have been asked.  Like I said before " Hindsight is always 20/20.


Gary Walsch
Sunshine State Reptiles