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Roughly a week ago a thread was started on Dakka claiming that the owner of the company Resin Forge was none other that Daniel Mandelbaum.

A couple of days ago, I received a Cease & Desist letter sent on behalf of Resin Forge and the owners of the company listed in the letter: Mr. Daniel Mandelbaum, Mr. Jason Martin & Mrs. Kim Hernandez, essentially asking me to stop defaming their clients (which would be both Resin Forge and its owners), claiming that this defamation has led to improper personal information being shared as well as alleged threats of bodily harm up to and including death.

If you'd like to read the contents of the letter yourself, I have included a copy of its text at the end of this post in spoiler tags.

To be perfectly clear, none of the posts in this previous thread were made by me, nor were they representative of my personal views as the owner and administrator of this website. I personally have no firsthand experience dealing with Resin Forge or its owners by their given names in any capacity.

While I do not acknowledge that the existence of this previous thread on Dakka constitutes me defaming Resin Forge or its owners, I do believe that the contents of this Cease & Desist letter acknowledging that Daniel Mandelbaum is indeed the owner of Resin Forge essentially makes that previous thread redundant and therefore I have no issues complying with the request to remove that information (and as such the previous thread has since been removed).

Naturally anyone interested in Mr. Mandelbaum and any of his alleged aliases (such as Matthew Bonder, RedStarOne, Lord.Serpius, Kellz1234, Susan Beasley) or his alleged involvement with a number of now defunct sites/businesses while using those aliases (such as Conversion Corner, Miniature Wargame Conversions, Three Stage Studios, Lord.Serpius ebay account, Great.Hobby.Bits ebay account, Double.Your.Bits ebay account) should feel free to do their own research and come to their own conclusions.


While this thread will be left open for replies, it is very important to remember that no posts defaming, threatening or harassing Resin Forge or its owners will be allowed. Anyone breaking this rule will have their post edited or deleted and their account may be subject to further disciplinary action. Please remain classy!


Here is the C&D letter text contents for those interested in reading it:




Update 5/13:

I have been provided with enough evidence to say with certainty that there is no such company as britcons.com (their website has since been taken down for those not following the proceedings of this thread day-to-day).

The Cease & Desist email was sent by someone pretending to be Michael Duerkop, the CEO of this fictitious company.

The real Michael Duerkop is just a photographer in Germany who owns the (long dormant) britcons.com domain. He has recently had several of his online accounts compromised (such as paypal, Facebook, go daddy, etc) and whomever compromised these accounts then used them to create the Britcons.com website that used to be there and send the Cease & Desist email from the info@Britcons.com email account (that they created).

Now, and this is very important, there is no evidence proving who was responsible for compromising his accounts and creating this charade. It is entirely possible that someone created this fake website, etc, and then went and misrepresented themselves to Resin Forge as being able to provide legal counsel. So please refrain from making any statements as though you *know* who was responsible, even if circumstantially it may seem obvious to you.

I will not be reinstating the previous thread, because as I've said a few times now, I'm much more comfortable with the way the information is presented in this current thread as opposed to the previous one.

I also will not be looking to pursue any legal actions for this whole matter because frankly I have no interest in wasting any more of my time on this ridiculousness. The entire point of the original thread (and this one) continues to be just to identify that Daniel Mandelbaum is an owner of Resin Forge, which has been amply accomplished by this point.



Update 5/13 #2:

I want to reiterate again that there is no concrete proof one way or another as to who it was that claimed to be Michael Duerkop and emailed the C&D letter.

I can confirm that the 'real' Michael Duerkop did receive a paypal payment from Resin Forge, however at the time that payment was sent whomever was pretending to be Michael Duerkop (and had the Britcons.com website up and running) also had access to that paypal account.

It could have been someone from Dakka, it could have been someone from Resin Forge (just sending themselves payment to themselves through his account), or it could have even been the 'real' Michael Duerkop who did it and is just now claiming to have had his accounts hacked.

So again, there is no proof as to who had control of the real Michael Duerkop's accounts and sent out the C&D letter. Or in other words, the ONLY person I can verify that did not send that C&D letter and pretend to be Michael Duerkop is myself (and even that you'll have to just take my word on).

So again, I'd ask everyone to please refrain from assuming that you know who it was that pretended to be the CEO of Britcons.com and sent that C&D letter. Could it have been someone from Resin Forge? It is possible, but it is also possible that someone else pretended to be Michael Duerkop to them and then claimed he could provide them with legal services.

The most important thing is: I DON'T CARE. I complied with the Cease & Desist letter (whoever it may have been sent by) and have no further interest in trying to figure out who allegedly hacked the real Michael Duerkop's online accounts and sent the C&D email.

If the situation deteriorates:

Do you need donations?

Do you know about Ken at Popehat.com? He's a free speech attorney who is also a gamer and regularly connects bloggers / forums with pro bono representation in cases like this.

The thread was taken down. So as of this point in time there should be no need for representation. I guess time will tell though if that holds up though.

German lawyers? Sounds extremely fishy.

Can a US entity even have German lawyers? I'd imagine they have little understanding of US law, as well as no BAR credentials here.

They are apparently a German private investigations company.

http://britcons.com/

 Ketara wrote:
They are apparently a German private investigations company.

http://britcons.com/

Our staff consists of current and former members of military and law enforcement communities. We believe that nothing can replace military experience when it comes to the line of work we are in. We employ and maintain operators and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) who possess the finest operational talent available on the planet. All members of our operational staff have had recent, real-world experience in virtually every combat theater or hotspot on the globe. They are the true "Silent Professionals."

So... dakka got a C&D from a band of mercenaries?

 Aerethan wrote:
Who is Britcons LTD. I see nothing on google to suggest such a law firm actually exists.

Britcon afaik is a civil engineering company in England.

http://britcons.com/


It is allegedly a company in Germany, that among other things, offers legal counsel.

Whether or not this company actually exists or the C&D was actually written by someone else is irrelevant to me. The point of the previous thread was ultimately to establish that Daniel Mandelbaum was the owner of Resin Forge, something this C&D letter does beyond any shadow of a doubt and therefore I have no problem removing that previous thread.

 Ketara wrote:
They are apparently a German private investigations company.

http://britcons.com/

I'll gladly take this on. I was personally harassed at work by Daniel Mandelbaum. I have like 900% evidence to that end.

Investigate all you want. Also, PI's are not lawyers, and I'd take their threats with the largest grain of salt in the land.

Surely no one would imply this C and D is not on the up and up? It looks legit to me....

...

Regardless, as Yak said, we have now confirmed 7 ways to tuesday that Resinforge is owned by Daniel Mandelbaum, including confirmation from Mandelbaum himself now. That's all we ever wanted.

At the end of the day, Resin Forge is either in whole or in part owned by Daniel Mandenbaum and his past history here on DakkaDakka and on other sites speaks for itself, irregardless of how he behaves today under other identities or entities.

 Aerethan wrote:

 Ketara wrote:
They are apparently a German private investigations company.

http://britcons.com/

I'll gladly take this on. I was personally harassed at work by Daniel Mandelbaum. I have like 900% evidence to that end.

Investigate all you want. Also, PI's are not lawyers, and I'd take their threats with the largest grain of salt in the land.

I'd love to hear how that goes! Don't think you can get any more solid proof of harassment!
I understand why Yak pulled it. I personally appreciate how long he left it up and can only hope it helps (more) people from getting screwed over by him.

Hear hear!

It looks like britcons.com had some trouble getting their website working about a year ago:

http://support.godaddy.com/members/alphamike/

Maybe not a crack team of mercenaries.


Also no record of a lawyer named Michael Duerkop that I could find. Practicing law without a license is a no no.

Also, isn't the statement of facts proven by multiple witnesses as well as previous posts and activities call out of the bounds of what is considered defamation?

This is precisely the kind of information that should not be posted in this thread. -- yakface.

The collection of posts detailing transactions that members made that were not honored is a long way from defaming a company or individual.

A history of companies traced to an individual that did not honor sales on multiple transactions according to members of Dakka I find hard to identify defaming a business.

To warn others of a disagreeable level of "service" is a public service of it's own, so evidence of "malice" is not there.

Some individuals would understandably get a bit excited since it seems they have first hand knowledge of not receiving what was paid for.

With what discomfort this person is getting from their dealings is deserved and is very funny to see them resorting to legal methods to try to smother the outcry.

This deserves a little digging.

Thanks

Wow Britcon's does not seem dodgy at all....

This is hilarious.

My client has even received Death Threats due to your Website.

That seems like a rather ambitious statement to make, never mind that it has been stated as a fact.

Ignoring the obvious irony that they are making these allegations whilst at the same time demanding that nobody else make allegations about them, have they provided any evidence of these 'death threats'? Have they provided any evidence that Dakka is the source of these 'death threats'? Have they provided any evidence to support this in any form at all?

From here (a rather uncomfortable wooden chair in front of a screen), it seems a mite hypocritical.

To be very clear:

Even if someone is involved in multiple businesses where some customers do not end up receiving the goods/services they paid for, that does not make that individual a 'scammer' unless that person is convicted of some wrongdoing or there is actual verbal/written proof of intent from that individual to scam/defraud.

So please refrain from using loaded and improper terms (like 'scammer') and instead stick to actual verifiable facts.

In addition, if you find personal information regarding an individual and want to collate it and publish it on your own website, feel free to do so, but please do not post it in this thread.


Thank you.

 Talizvar wrote:
The collection of posts detailing transactions that members made that were not honored is a long way from defaming a company or individual.

Whether or not it's actually defamation (and, as you said, the evidence speaks for itself) this person can still cause a lot of legal trouble for the forum owners. Since the whole point of the thread was to establish that a specific person was behind the company and everyone already knows to avoid them once that fact is known the thread was redundant and there's no reason for the forum owners to take the risk.

Of course the irony here is that by making this legal threat he's accomplished exactly what his "enemies" have wanted all along, and done more damage to his own reputation than any "defaming" thread ever could have.

So let me work this out:

- This guy allegedly performed some less than honest business through his website. The thread outlining such activities has resulted in him receiving threats, so he's asked us to take it down, confirming Yak's initial idea that he was in fact, in charge of the company?

I wonder if Resin Forge will address the issue on Facebook and announce that Daniel Mandelbaum, part-owner of Resin Forge, has send a legal document requesting that DakkaDakka no longer post that Daniel Mandelbaum, part-owner of Resin Forge, is a bad person.

Seems to be plenty of legal happy people targeting gaming sites these days.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Talizvar wrote:
The collection of posts detailing transactions that members made that were not honored is a long way from defaming a company or individual.

Whether or not it's actually defamation (and, as you said, the evidence speaks for itself) this person can still cause a lot of legal trouble for the forum owners. Since the whole point of the thread was to establish that a specific person was behind the company and everyone already knows to avoid them once that fact is known the thread was redundant and there's no reason for the forum owners to take the risk.

Of course the irony here is that by making this legal threat he's accomplished exactly what his "enemies" have wanted all along, and done more damage to his own reputation than any "defaming" thread ever could have.

The word is out, unless a class action lawsuit can be made to bring all these failed transactions together into a big picture: he is counting on the individuals feeling the lost money being insufficient to press charges.
He can always just start another company and it all can start again. Easy fix.

It is not justice, but is a very practical solution he may take.

Depends if they really are legal people. This is pretty much the only site they show up on in Google, just saying.

It also seems to be a very slap bang put together website.

Anyone would be able to whip that up in about 20 mins.

Unidentified scumbag 1: "Lets make a legal website to scare certain people, how do we do it?"

Unidentified scumbag 2: "Hmmmmm, lets make it white and say its run by rogue commando's, that should do the trick"

Has there been any suggestion that the other forums have been sent C+D letters, and other people within the community. This needs to be a community based push.

 Doctadeth wrote:
Has there been any suggestion that the other forums have been sent C+D letters, and other people within the community. This needs to be a community based push.

Given that everything started and/or originated on Dakka Dakka, it would be the natural and only website worth targeting; all other sites or blogs are either too minor or have already taken down or heavily moderated the subject to death.

Our staff consists of current and former members of military and law enforcement communities. We believe that nothing can replace military experience when it comes to the line of work we are in. We employ and maintain operators and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) who possess the finest operational talent available on the planet. All members of our operational staff have had recent, real-world experience in virtually every combat theater or hotspot on the globe. They are the true "Silent Professionals."

*Cue A-Team theme tune.*

Did somebody say something bad about you on the internet? Are toy soldier websites causing you trouble? If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire...