Bad Guy Danny Cueva, budding young scam artist

[boabasement]

Danny emailed me a few weeks ago looking at one of my female anerythristic Colombian Rainbow Boas priced at $500 shipped. I shipped the animal after receiving his payment via PayPal on 2-16-2017 and arriving in Las Vegas New Mexico noon his time. On 2-18-2017, I received an email from him at 11:19 pm stating that he palpated the animal and was sure that it was a male. Less then 2 hours, there was an email from PayPal that he had opened a case against me, this email arrived at 1:06 am on 2-19-2017, BTW, I had all ready shut down for the day around 10:00 pm on 2-18-2017.
Now, Danny had told me previous to all this BS that he was a grad student down in New Mexico in the field of Herpetology and that he knew what he was doing. Now in my almost 30 years of breeding reptiles and keeping them for over 45 years, I never got the memo that palpating was the preferred way of sexing snakes in the field of Herpetology.
I contacted PayPal and requested that the animal be returned and Danny would receive all of his money upon return of the animal back to me, Sounds easy Right? Nope, I received a box via UPS on 2-23-2017 and opened it to find a box with some crumbled up newspaper and an empty snake bag as well as zero heat packs in the box. Upon further investigation, the lable itself on the box stated that it was shipped 2 day air and the weight of the box was 1 pound, that is less then when I shipped the box with the animal actually in it.
Upon contacting Danny about this Bs, he stated that I was trying to rip him off which is also what he stated to PayPal in his original complaint and denied that what actually happened with a empty box was nothing but a lie on my behalf.
I informed him in no uncertain terms that he was looking at a world of hurt and that I would open a case against him for Interstate Fraud as well as all the false documents he filed with PayPal.
Today, 2-24-2017, I filed a case with my local Police Department and will be submitting that case with PayPal to get my money released back into my account.

 

[boabasement]

Danny Cueva, Budding young scam artist

I also noticed that he informed PayPal of the shipment on 2-22-2017 that the shipment was on the way when in fact it was all ready a full day in transit, this too is filing a false document with PayPal and I have the box and label still in tact and will also be used in my case against this scam bag.
I know this is just my problem at this time and it will come to a conclusion eventually but this guy may pop up one day trying to sell animals and this is just to inform those who do there home work that this guy can't play fair and will do this again in the future to some unsuspecting customer that only wants to acquire an animal that they will charish.
Now in the past a few other scammers have accused me of ripping them off on this forum but they always fell short with any sort of real evidence like what I have laid out here for all to see and the hand full of these types of people have always crawled back into their holes when the light of the truth was shined upon their corruption.
I literally have 1000s of very satisfied customrs and quite still do business with me today and even after reading some of the accusations against me, stated that they loved my customer relations and would and still do acquire animals from e to add to their collections of cherished pets and breeders.
I will let you all know how this case winds up.
Thanks for looking,
Doug Matuszak
Boa Basement

 

[NathanKS]

It would be useful to see communication between you two.

 

[DCueva]

So glad Doug decided to post this for the world to see, as it can be known the true character of Douglas R Matuszak.

the full story: (and I apologize as it is a long one)
I had been looking for a female ghost colombian rainbow boa to pair with my animals, and noticed Doug had two separate ads up on kingsnake.com (which have since been removed), one for 3.0 2016 male ghost colombian rainbow boas, and one for 0.3 2016 female ghost colombian rainbow boas. Time passed and i noticed the ads were modified to 3.1 available, and eventually I could not find the female ad up anymore. This is when I first emailed Doug if he had any females still available. He did, and we requested he offer it frozen thawed, you get the picture.... fast forward to when he males me the animal.

The animal arrives packaged in a typical box, heat packs, snake bag and newspaper. no surprises there. When I open the bag the animal inside is this ghost colombian rainbow boa, in the blue, very wrinkled and dehydrated measuring no less then 18 inches. This was the first thing which surprised me, as a 2016 colombian rainbow boa should not be so large, (I placed the animal next to some known 2016 babies produced by a reputable breeder, and everyone agreed it was huge) I immediately placed the animal in some moist cocofiber and left it to drink and headed out to work.

when I returned, the animal had shed and was looking much better, but i still thought it was odd how large it was for a 2016 baby. throughout the night, i kept thinking about it and thats when I decided to palpate the animal.
MALE. Clear as day, felt the two hemipenes roll. Now this isn't some newborn baby, but an animal atleast 18 inches long, so I am positive of what I felt, but I check six more times just to confirm, and proceed to check every boid in my collection. Yup, all the males still have hemipenes, and the females none. nothing has changed.

Message a few boa breeders on facebook. They say they have made mistakes before on newborn babies, and its about 90% accurate to palpate, but its possible for a male to be sexed as female, usually if you feel something its doubtful for it to be a female. Then they ask me who I bought it from...
Doug Matuszak. same response from all of them: i've never done business with him and never will. each is surprised he is still in business, and no surprise he is still up to the same tricks.

So I send Doug an email that the animal he sent me is a male and not a female, and I would need the issue corrected or a refund. I also notify paypal requesting a refund. Granted it is late in the evening here as I do work and go to school, and Doug in Ohio is in a time zone two hours ahead of me, I decide an email is more appropriate than potentially waking him up.

I am woken up the next day by a phone call from Doug, cursing me out that I am a fucking idiot and why did I have to get paypal involved, and that now they are holding up his money and he will never do business with me again. he tells me I will need to probe or pop the animal and confirm it is male, and send it back, and IF he finds it is male he will issue me a refund. By this point I have read the previous BOI doug matuszak post on faunaclassifieds ( http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118520 ) informing me of the way he conducts business. I notify paypal of the threats he has made to me verbally, and I would like to recieve a refund and send the animal back. They inform me I would need to send the animal first, and the refund would be issued just to be sure to insure the package and provide a tracking number.

I request a partial refund from Doug to avoid a potential headache of shipping a live animal, but he ultimately ignores it. I also have the animal probed and popped by my professor, a respected herpetologist, without telling him the alleged sex, and he says it is male (picture attached). I send the photos to Doug and ask him what sex the animal is, but he never ackowledges his mistake. I also send the photo out to several rainbow boa breeders to sex the animal and they all confirm male, as the hemipenes are clearly everted. Due to a March 1st deadline and my research obligations, as well as unpredicatable weather this time of year for shipping reptiles (the week prior the high was 35 degrees f and a low of 12 F), I feed the snake and pack it in the same box, minus the heatpacks (new mexico was close to 70 degrees when I shipped it) and send it out. insured and everything, and head back to the lab. Once I get home from work, I enter the tracking number to Paypal, and I believe that is the last time I ever have to deal with Doug.

I was wrong. I get numerous emails from Doug afterwards saying he never received the package, yet he signed for it. He is threatening me that he is going to go to the police, and UPS, and paypal when he recieved the animal and is claiming he hasn't.

Just want everyone to realize the character that Doug Matuszak is, and I have attached some of the emails he sent. You be the judgement of character. I have also attached a photo of the animal he sent me, popped by my professor and independently confirmed male. He is claiming in this post that I am a "budding young scam artist", yet only one of us has a proven track record of conducting shady business.

A quick google search revealed Douglas R Matuszak has been arrested twice, so I must ask .... for what?

 

[Lucille]

Then they ask me who I bought it from...
Doug Matuszak. same response from all of them: i've never done business with him and never will. each is surprised he is still in business, and no surprise he is still up to the same tricks.

Danny,
Please identify these breeders by name. And also the professor who sexed the snake. Do you have photos of the snake as you received it? It is hard to tell but the one in the picture does not appear wrinkled or hedydrated.
It would be good to establish that the pictured snake is the same snake that had been sent to you.
Doug's note to you that discussing this transaction is libel is not true. You may discuss facts, and you may offer opinion in reference to this issue as long as it is clearly an opinion.


Doug, One would expect the package returned to you to weigh somewhat less because it has no heat pack. Could you please scan and post the weight of the package you received, scan a heat pack showing its weight, and the two weights added.

Also please scan and post the weight of the package you had shipped to Danny.

 

[DCueva]

Ike Lightner, Ben Holmes, Trace Hardin, Jeff Kuhl and Jeff Clark all identified the animal as male.
I do not have a photo of the animal as it arrived, only later in the day after staying in damp cocofiber with a water bowl for several hours.
The package didnt arrive until noon and I was already late for meetings and working in the lab.

 

[JCCS]

Danny, did you send Doug back an empty box as he claims? Other than that, that snake is obviously male. Doug, on that note, palpating boas is the most accurate way of sexing a boa. It doesn't work on all species, but it does work on epicrates. I'll believe a palpation before a popping or a probing. On the size of the boa, I've seen many boas that Doug raised that were far bigger than typical. It's quite obvious he overfeeds them.

Also, Doug, I honestly don't know how you've stayed in business with how unprofessional you handle situations. Yes, Danny ran to paypal way quicker than he should have, but since you were going to refund him for the snake anyway, it wasn't the end of the world unless he didn't return the snake. You treated him like dirt and that's not acceptable. You let your temper control your actions far too often. Do you have a tracking # for the empty package Danny supposedly sent to you?

 

[DCueva]

No. I have no reason whatsoever to send an empty box as he is claiming. I packed the animal in a snake bag, in the box and sent it on its way.
Thank you JCCS for aknowledging the way Doug responded to me was completely unprofessional. I am still awaiting an apology from Doug.

 

[JCCS]

Honestly, I believe you as it would be too easy to prove if it was true.

 

[Fangthane]

Nope, I received a box via UPS on 2-23-2017 and opened it to find a box with some crumbled up newspaper and an empty snake bag as well as zero heat packs in the box. Upon further investigation, the lable itself on the box stated that it was shipped 2 day air and the weight of the box was 1 pound, that is less then when I shipped the box with the animal actually in it.

Now in the past a few other scammers have accused me of ripping them off on this forum but they always fell short with any sort of real evidence like what I have laid out here for all to see...

What real evidence are you talking about, exactly? So far, you've simply told a story - you haven't supplied anything that amounts to actual evidence. Since you reference having past issues where people have made accusations that you claim were false, did you have the foresight to shoot an unboxing video that would undeniably prove there was no snake present? If not, it seems like an odd choice for someone who's in the middle of a disputed transaction - especially someone who seems to want to be perceived as an old pro who's too savvy to not to cover his ass. Since you mentioned that you still have it, and it's intact, how about a clear pic of the shipping label?

 

[Mistyck]

So is Danny Cueva in Las Vegas, NM, or in Miami, Fl?

Danny, please provide proof of the shipment back to Doug. That will show the weight, date of shipment & other details.

Doug, you're coming across as a crass individual, no matter how you cut it. If it's a fraud show, then it is what it is. But you haven't been an angel in this deal either, and if you cannot communicate in a decent manner with your buyers, then don't be in business. I get you're frustrated, but you have to show some self control in how you handle it.

 

[juliasara]

Do you still have the original tracking number from when the snake was first shipped to Danny? If you could post that here too that would be really helpful.

 

[Lucille]

Doug, One would expect the package returned to you to weigh somewhat less because it has no heat pack. Could you please scan and post the weight of the package you received, scan a heat pack showing its weight, and the two weights added.

Also please scan and post the weight of the package you had shipped to Danny.

Danny you should have this information as well and you could post it along with screen shots:

The weight of the package you received
The weight of the package you sent out
The weight of the heat pack you received in the first package

Also the weight of your snake (a screen shot of it on the scale)

Even if as you have said the snake was a bit wrinkled/dehydrated, the weight of an 18 inch boid is not negligible. All of the information which would tend to prove/disprove whether there was a snake in the box that Doug received is available.

 

[tlmoon]

Interesting that neither party seems to be supplying what would be pretty easy evidence by posting what Lucille mentioned above. The weights of the packages would be quite telling, and I'm very curious if the buyer did send the snake back via 2 day UPS without heat packs. It may have been 70 that day in his location, but it's still winter and there is the temps at the seller's location to consider.

I think the buyer overreacted and didn't give the seller the chance to make this situation right. I can see why he had some concerns, but disputing the paypal without even talking to the seller isn't great practice either. At least contact the guy first and give him a shot to fix it.

On the other hand, I'm very surprised that the seller, having posted the accusation about about the buyer sending an empty box, is not providing evidence to support that claim. Surely he would have taken some quick pics and/or documentation about the package?

 

[DCueva]

I dont have any such weights and never weighed the animal unfortunately when I had it in my possesion. So I cant supply such information.
No I do not have the weight of the four heatpacks that were orriginally sent with the animal as I threw them away when they arrived.

Yes, it is true i mailed the animal two day shipping with no heatpacks, but as mentioned before, it is my first time ahipping a live animal. I dont even know where you get heatpacks from. Are they like handwarmers?

It was my understanding that reptiles have much better tolerence to lower temperatures for short periods of time then too much heat, and heat packs usually arent used above 60 degrees.

Interesting that neither party seems to be supplying what would be pretty easy evidence by posting what Lucille mentioned above. The weights of the packages would be quite telling, and I'm very curious if the buyer did send the snake back via 2 day UPS without heat packs. It may have been 70 that day in his location, but it's still winter and there is the temps at the seller's location to consider.

I think the buyer overreacted and didn't give the seller the chance to make this situation right. I can see why he had some concerns, but disputing the paypal without even talking to the seller isn't great practice either. At least contact the guy first and give him a shot to fix it.

On the other hand, I'm very surprised that the seller, having posted the accusation about about the buyer sending an empty box, is not providing evidence to support that claim. Surely he would have taken some quick pics and/or documentation about the package?

 

[DavidBeard]

I dont have any such weights and never weighed the animal unfortunately when I had it in my possesion. So I cant supply such information.
No I do not have the weight of the four heatpacks that were orriginally sent with the animal as I threw them away when they arrived.

Yes, it is true i mailed the animal two day shipping with no heatpacks, but as mentioned before, it is my first time ahipping a live animal. I dont even know where you get heatpacks from. Are they like handwarmers?

It was my understanding that reptiles have much better tolerence to lower temperatures for short periods of time then too much heat, and heat packs usually arent used above 60 degrees.

They're not asking for weights on the snake itself, Danny, they are referring to the weight of the BOX you shipped. Surely you have a receipt or some sort of paperwork you can post to show you indeed shipped a box with a snake inside it? Unless you illegally shipped the animal and are avoiding posting incriminating information.....just something that popped into my head as a possibility.

How is it that you know all these respected breeders and herpetologists, yet are completely ignorant of shipping methods when it comes to reptiles? I find that hard to believe as well.

Thus far, neither of you have offered anything in the realm of empirical evidence of anything you've said, other than a picture of a male snake that *might* be the one you purchased. Lots of conjecture and posturing but not much else.

 

[nickolasanastasiou]

This threads seems a bit light on answers so far.

Four heat packs? Goodness.

 

[Lucille]

I dont have any such weights and never weighed the animal unfortunately when I had it in my possesion. So I cant supply such information.
No I do not have the weight of the four heatpacks that were orriginally sent with the animal as I threw them away when they arrived.

Yes, it is true i mailed the animal two day shipping with no heatpacks, but as mentioned before, it is my first time ahipping a live animal. I dont even know where you get heatpacks from. Are they like handwarmers?

It was my understanding that reptiles have much better tolerence to lower temperatures for short periods of time then too much heat, and heat packs usually arent used above 60 degrees.

Danny

You have no doubt saved the box the snake arrived in, so you have the total weight. You shipped the snake out hopefully not USPS but you paid for shipping so you know the weight of the box you sent out. Please post that info.
Two day shipping is not ideal from the perspective of keeping the critter safe.

I am surprised Doug has not weighed in with the requested information (unless USPS was used by him as the carrier). It seems both sides roared in initially but seem oddly reticent in providing the info that would take them mere minutes to find.
Those who may at some point want to transact future business with either party here, may see this reticence as a red flag.

 

[TraceH]

I have been following this fiasco since Danny unboxed the snake and originally suspected it was a male. He came to numerous respected breeders of Epicrates to ask their advice. This really should have been a simple solution, people make mistakes, send back the snake and get a refund or replacement. I suggested to immediately stop the PayPal transaction, since I personally know Danny and am confident that he would be good on his end and send the snake back. That is when the threats and name calling came in from The Boa Basement, who does that? He exasperated a simple problem and is now trying to make false accusations on fauna? Yes, Danny is new to selling snakes and may not know the details of shipping but he shouldn't have been put in the situation where he even needed to ship. This is all on The Boa Basement, you made a mistake, just own it and move on. Danny is a good guy, intelligent herper, and will make a great breeder/ hobbyist one day. Sorry you're dealing with this Danny, not everyone in the hobby conducts business this way.

 

[Mistyck]

I dont have any such weights and never weighed the animal unfortunately when I had it in my possesion. So I cant supply such information.
No I do not have the weight of the four heatpacks that were orriginally sent with the animal as I threw them away when they arrived.

Yes, it is true i mailed the animal two day shipping with no heatpacks, but as mentioned before, it is my first time ahipping a live animal. I dont even know where you get heatpacks from. Are they like handwarmers?

It was my understanding that reptiles have much better tolerence to lower temperatures for short periods of time then too much heat, and heat packs usually arent used above 60 degrees.

Interesting how you're choosing to pick what questions you want to answer.

Danny; Do you reside in New Mexico or Florida? It's not that hard of an answer to give. There is a reason that I asked it.

We specifically asked for the weight of the box that you shipped back, just as we asked Doug for the weight of the box that he shipped. The heatpack weight was asked of Doug, not you Danny. As a seller who ships frequently, he should have that information on hand.

You actually should have paperwork showing the shipping direction that you took; i.e. receipt of payment with tracking number. Also, I would assume that if the critter was shipped to you using "Next Day" that you would ASSUME that's how you had to send it back.

No heatpacks are NOT handwarmers. They are different. NEVER use handwarmers.

Your "understanding" of reptiles tolerance doesn't matter in this instance, and you should have asked the "reputable" people you talked to how to handle the shipping back.