[meteorite-list] Mifflin, Amiss

From: drtanuki <drtanuki_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 19:57:44 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <300043.64800.qm_at_web161205.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>

Hi Michael, Great job as always; thank you!
   It seems that Carl needs to come clean and name the person that he "bought" the material from? Carl at least owes us that courtesy if he wants to maintain any respectability in the meteorite world?

 From what I read the water is too murky if someone spends any amount of money to buy from an "unknown" finder? seller and cannot? remember their name, etc.? And address? A city? Anything?

Carl how much of this material did this finder? seller help you put on the market?
  Carl? Do you have an explanation? Please do give us the whole and factual story.
Carl I am not accusing you of anything; rather hoping that you will quickly clear up matters before further commotion appears in the henhouse.
Best Regards, Dirk Ross...Tokyo



--- On Sun, 5/8/11, michael cottingham <mikewren at gilanet.com> wrote:

> From: michael cottingham <mikewren at gilanet.com>
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Mifflin, Amiss
> To: "drtanuki" <drtanuki at yahoo.com>
> Cc: "jason utas" <jasonutas at gmail.com>, meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Date: Sunday, May 8, 2011, 11:38 AM
> Hello,
>
> Good question. I have accounted for and taken "out" of the
> gene pool, almost all of the bad Mifflin that I got dragged
> into. I do not know about the others.
>
> Best Wishes
>
> Michael Cottingham
> On May 7, 2011, at 8:31 PM, drtanuki wrote:
>
> > Jason,?
> > You raise several good points and analysis.? One
> further question that should be asked is how many grams of
> this rock were put into the market as Mifflin? And have they
> made their way into the "gene pool" to how many buyers and
> sellers and yet to reproduce more offspring? Dirk
> Ross...Tokyo
> >
> >
> > --- On Sun, 5/8/11, jason utas <jasonutas at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> From: jason utas <jasonutas at gmail.com>
> >> Subject: [meteorite-list] Mifflin, Amiss
> >> To: "Meteorite-list" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> >> Date: Sunday, May 8, 2011, 10:12 AM
> >> Hello All,
> >>
> >> My story begins in the summer of last year.?
> I saw
> >> some strange pieces
> >> of 'Mifflin' on ebay that I thought looked funny.
>
> >> People were talking
> >> about the meteorite having two lithologies,
> but...the
> >> slices and
> >> individuals that I saw looked 'off.'? A
> select few
> >> looked like
> >> H-chondrites, and they had the telltale signs of
> wear that
> >> freshly-imported Moroccan falls bear: worn edges,
> exposed
> >> metal flakes
> >> on protruding corners (where the fusion crust had
> been worn
> >> off due to
> >> improper packing), etc.
> >>
> >> At the time, I did nothing but send a private
> email to Anne
> >> Black
> >> notifying her of my suspicions.? I spoke with
> some
> >> other prominent
> >> list-members addressing it, and they all agreed
> that the
> >> material
> >> looked funny, but that nothing could be done about
> it given
> >> the
> >> required burden of proof.
> >>
> >> So, I sat on my hands for several months.
> >>
> >> Just over a month ago, I saw a piece of the
> funny-looking
> >> 'Mifflin' on
> >> ebay. It looked similar to some pieces that I
> remembered
> >> seeing on
> >> ebay months before, and, being an end-cut, I was
> able to
> >> see both the
> >> stone's funny-looking inside -- and the apparent
> metal
> >> grains on the
> >> stone's exterior.
> >>
> >> I used the 'buy-it-now' option to purchase the
> end-cut, and
> >> it
> >> arrived while Peter and I were in Morocco.?
> When we
> >> returned, I
> >> promptly shipped the end-cut off to Tony Irving of
> the
> >> University of
> >> Washington; he agreed to analyze the stone
> posthaste.
> >>
> >> The results came back, but Tony wanted to wait
> until the
> >> probe was
> >> recallibrated so that he could run it again to be
> sure.
> >>
> >> Lo and behold, he did confirm that my end-cut was
> an
> >> equilibrated
> >> H-chondrite, with an olivine Fa of 18.6.?
> For
> >> comparison, Chergach and
> >> Bassikounou both have Fa contents of 18.4 and
> 18.6,
> >> respectively.
> >>
> >> University of Madison, Wisconsin performed most of
> the work
> >> on the
> >> Mifflin fall.? Between them and the Field
> Museum, over
> >> twenty separate
> >> stones were analyzed.? They were all
> L5.? Mifflin
> >> is classified as an
> >> L5, with an Fa of ~24.9 +/- 0.2.
> >>
> >> I then sent Tony the link to the ebay auction so
> he could
> >> confirm that
> >> the piece that he had analyzed was indeed the
> piece that I
> >> had sent
> >> him.? He did.
> >>
> >> I purchased my end-cut from Bryan Scarborough
> (IMCA), who
> >> purchased it
> >> from Michael Cottingham, who purchased it from
> Greg
> >> Catterton (IMCA),
> >> who purchased the stone with Carl Esparza from the
> finder.
> >>
> >> Carl told me the following story over the phone:
> >> He was contacted "out of the blue" by someone
> hunting in
> >> the Mifflin
> >> strewn-field.? According to Carl, the finder
> stated
> >> that he thought
> >> there was a "conspiracy against him," because no
> one would
> >> offer him
> >> more than $5/g. and he believed his finds were
> worth more
> >> than that.
> >> So, according to Carl, he then offered the finder
> $10/g,
> >> and a deal was
> >> struck.
> >>
> >> But...the finder asked that he not be paid via
> paypal or
> >> wire
> >> transfer; he wanted cash mailed to a P.O. Box.
> >>
> >> So, Carl mailed the money to the P.O. Box and the
> first of
> >> two 'Mifflin'
> >> stones was over-nighted to him the next day.?
> It
> >> should be noted that
> >> Carl included Greg Catterton as his partner in
> this deal,
> >> and Greg
> >> sent over several hundred dollars to help pay for
> the
> >> stones.
> >>
> >> Unfortunately, as Carl said over the phone, his
> old
> >> computer recently
> >> died, so he lacks the name and email address of
> the finder,
> >> as well as
> >> the number/address of the P.O. Box to which he
> sent the
> >> money.? Carl
> >> is also unwilling to share the bank receipt from
> the
> >> transaction which
> >> would prove that he did make a large cash
> withdrawal for
> >> the stones.
> >> I asked Carl for the finder's phone number, but he
> told me
> >> that he had
> >> recently tried to call the finder, himself, only
> to find
> >> that the
> >> number had been disconnected.
> >> He was unwilling to share the number with me,
> regardless.
> >>
> >> On the phone, Carl suggested that his source had
> likely
> >> ripped him
> >> off, and he said that he believed that it was the
> reason
> >> why he had
> >> been asked to send the money untraceably, as he
> did; Carl
> >> described
> >> the situation as a "typical scam."
> >>
> >> He also suggested that the stones *might* be from
> an
> >> unrelated fall --
> >> or could be the result of Mifflin being an
> 'Almahata Sitta
> >> sort of
> >> fall.'
> >>
> >> I can't disprove either of those ideas, but they
> are
> >> unlikely for the
> >> following reasons:
> >>
> >> 1) Almahata Sitta is a unique event in the history
> of
> >> meteoritics.
> >> Different lithologies have been observed in many
> >> meteorites, but to
> >> have individual stones of completely different
> and
> >> unrelated meteorite
> >> types falling separately is unique.? Out of
> the 1,238
> >> accepted
> >> observed falls in the meteoritical bulletin, only
> one has
> >> exhibited
> >> individuals that have consisted of different
> meteorite
> >> types (for
> >> example, H + L, Ureilite + EH, etc).
> >>
> >> And it's not that we haven't been looking for
> similar
> >> events; with
> >> each and every fall, multiple stones are analyzed,
> and the
> >> simple fact
> >> of the matter is that they are always
> similar...with *one*
> >> exception.
> >>
> >> So, Almahata Sitta is an exception.? How much
> of an
> >> exception?? 0.08%
> >> of meteorite falls are like it.? Less than a
> tenth of
> >> a percent.
> >> Possible...but extremely unlikely.? We also
> have to
> >> wonder about why
> >> or how this hunter managed to find the only two
> H's from
> >> the fall that
> >> were recognized.? Over twenty other stones
> were
> >> studied and this
> >> finder supposedly turned up two or three that were
> all
> >> H's.? It's 'funny.'
> >>
> >> The other possibility that Carl advocated is that
> the
> >> stones may actually
> >> have been found in Wisconsin -- and they may be
> part of a
> >> new fall that
> >> somehow slipped under the radar.? He
> initially
> >> suggested that they were
> >> from the fireball widely seen across the Midwest
> on May
> >> 10th, but, at the
> >> time, I had paypal records from Greg that stated
> that he
> >> had sent Carl the
> >> money for the stones as early as April 24th.
> >> So we ruled out that possibility..
> >>
> >> But, I agree; the stones could theoretically have
> come from
> >> a
> >> different fall.? The end-cut that I bought
> showed no
> >> visible signs of
> >> weathering.? No oxide, no anything.?
> Given the
> >> weather in and around
> >> Mifflin at the time of the fall, we can assume
> that the
> >> stones were
> >> picked up within a week or so of having
> fallen.? No
> >> AMS reports of
> >> anything in the region for the given timeframe
> doesn't
> >> disprove
> >> anything since meteorites often fall without much
> ado,
> >> but...two falls
> >> in the same place *at the same time?*
> >> Granted, it's possible.? Not very likely,
> though.
> >>
> >> And you've still got to wonder about why no one
> else found
> >> any
> >> H-chondrites while looking for Mifflin.? It's
> not like
> >> meteorites were
> >> laying thickly on the ground.? Everyone who
> found
> >> stones out there put
> >> considerable time into hunting -- and they all
> found only
> >> L5's.? So if
> >> Carl's source were telling the truth, and he did
> find the
> >> stones, it
> >> seems best to assume that he wasn't hunting in the
> Mifflin
> >> strewn-field, because, if he were, he would 1)
> probably
> >> have found
> >> L5's, and 2) other people would probably have
> found H's as
> >> well.
> >>
> >> The conclusion I draw from this is that the truth
> has
> >> become
> >> well-hidden.? What is certain is that I have
> been
> >> refunded by
> >> Bryan, and I know for a fact that Bryan has been
> refunded
> >> by
> >> Michael Cottingham, who has in turn been refunded
> by Greg
> >> Catterton.
> >>
> >> What I have heard, however, is that Carl has been
> defending
> >> the
> >> legitimacy of his stones, and is refusing to
> refund Greg
> >> Catterton.
> >>
> >> Regardless of whether the material is Mifflin or
> another
> >> meteorite
> >> (from Wisconsin or from NWA -- it doesn't matter),
> the
> >> simple fact
> >> of the matter is that the material sold by Carl
> has been
> >> shown to be
> >> different from how it was advertised, and as such,
> he
> >> should be
> >> willing to accept its return for a refund.?
> If he
> >> wishes to get it
> >> analyzed and sell it to others as a new meteorite,
> that is
> >> his
> >> concern.
> >>
> >> I am fairly certain that Bryan, Michael, and Greg
> >> unknowingly sold the
> >> material as Mifflin, believing that it was indeed
> what they
> >> sold it
> >> as.
> >>
> >> That is my 2 cents.
> >>
> >> Regards,
> >> Jason Utas
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Received on Sat 07 May 2011 10:57:44 PM PDT