Apparently, some criminal taken down by the U.S. Marshals had a big old original Kenner mint on card collection. Now it’s being auctioned off. Word of warning, this guy was super into Gonk droids. Like a lot of Gonk Droids here.
https://txauction.com/auctions/1099/1/
I think these are even original Gonk production blueprints. Strange focus, but whatever flies your Kessel Run…
Holy cow, that’s a lot of Gonk droids…
Dude must have been super into Gonks. That and cocaine smuggling. Gonks and yayoh
they probably got a good deal buying the Gonk in bulk.
@drunkwooky I actually know this fellow and have had collecting interactions with him in the past. He was one of the foremost experts and established collectors relative to the Power Droid. Like Gus Lopez/Steve Sansweet level.
It was crazy to watch this whole thing unfold to be honest. There was a big money transaction for a very rare item taking place when this all unfolded and the back and forths about on the forums were pretty interesting and nobody could believe this guy would suddenly “not” provide/send the item which was paid for. He was pretty much the everyone’s friend and stand up guy in the vintage realm.
It was definitely one of those “you never know what is truly going on with a person behind closed doors” situations.
In thinking even more about it, it honestly makes me very sad. This fellow appeared to have it all. Beautiful family, beautiful home, a foremost collector in the hobby that was truly respected, super friendly and helpful to other collectors…Ugggg…just a real shame. Even now I look at his posts, his items, his sales, and his numerous accolades from other collectors. Everything down the drain. I feel bad for him family, the victims of his crimes, and I suppose…even for him a bit as sometimes life just spirals out of control.
He also had numerous “one of a kind” type items. Unfortunately, the entire collection and those items are a bit tainted because of the history. Quite a few gifts/things given in the name of charity, etc…that were ultimately sourced via nefarious means.
Wow. His collection looked familiar to me and I remember seeing posts about Gonk droid after Gonk droid.
Do you know what happened?
Ultimately, it was very large scale investment fraud.
Sounds like a pretty darn good movie.
The Wolf of Mos Eisley?
Hey, gotta pay for those Gonk droids some how. 
Some 10k to 20k items in there at my initial glance.
A very interesting thing about this auction/and the entire scenario is that Vintage Star Wars collecting is a fairly “elitist” type of hobby. When it comes to prototypes/first shots/production pieces…most transactions are behind closed doors and handled privately. The regular fellow, even if they have the biggest of pockets is unlikely to get access to the big player items.
This auction is sort of interesting in that opens that door. Won’t matter who you know…just how much you spend. Even with things like the Hakes auctions…you can bet the folks behind the scenes weed out many of the items to corresponding collectors/big names in the hobby.
Don’t get me wrong, there are also incredibly kind people in the hobby, but it really is pretty cutthroat at times. “Focus collecting” (collecting only one type of figure.card back, variations) is a pretty common thing now given the huge expanse of SW items. Granted, Power Droid certainly doesn’t hold the appeal that perhaps collecting Darth Vader does, but there are still plenty who covet droids or the Power droid alone.
This will be a fun auction to watch.
Man I just looked at some of the stuff he had. WOW JUST WOW!
Now I know why I haven’t seen a Gonk droid in the wild.
That auction was quite the event. Some very good deals and some very high end items that went for big $$$. I ended up getting what I wanted. Some real vintage rarities and one of kind items offered up.
The whole thing is pretty interesting. I’ve still never seen a single mention of this on any toy related forum, group, thread. It has definitely (imo) been a hush hush type of deal for those that may have known.
Thank you so much for posting about it! Got some beautiful pieces for my vintage collection.
Do you mind sharing what you get once you get them?
