[meteorite-list] My apology to Mike Farmer

From: Martin Altmann <altmann_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2013 14:33:41 +0200
Message-ID: <001901ce650d$96bd1f40$c4375dc0$_at_de>

(A.S.: Hi Art, please let it through, it's important for me, but also for
the collectors for not falling for the same scam)


Hello,

After a few days of contemplation (sorry for having been slow, but they were
necessary for me to cool down),
I want to publically and cordially apology to you all, and especially to
Mike Farmer, hoping he will accept it.
I was wrong and my reaction was crude, unjust and inadequate.
All three specimens in question turned out to be fakes.

Mike was right
and due to his expertise it was avoided that the pseudo-Estherville came in
further circulation,
neither the forged Bondoc nor the faked Murchison were distributed,
so that a direct damage, caused by my fault, to the community was averted.
Therefore we have to thank Mike.

Those fakes must have been built by someone, who has a deeper knowledge
about meteorites,
as it's relatively uncommon, that classical names of semi-rarely meteorites
are used and the fakes equipped with a legend and labels. (So far we can
recall only another case, the forged Dhofar-Moon, which was more easy to
unmask, as the specimens came with a "certification" of the university
Muenster, which doesn't issue such, and the find was only one stone, so that
the finder himself immediately could identify them as fakes, as no fragments
of that stone did exist).

We tried to investigate the case further, fearing that more of such fakes
will appear to the harm of the collectors.
But the seller seems to be now untraceable.
His name is: Jank? Zolt?n from Hungary. He claimed to have purchased an
older mineral collection a few years ago, where these specimens were a part
of among other meteorites. And the collector's name, he gave, is: J?zsef
Vida from Derecske.

So we ask you all, to be extremely cautious (and to inform us) if persons of
these names contact you.


Well, 33 years I was able to sort out the fakes, wrongs, mislabeled ones,
now I failed.
That shouldn't and that mustn't happen and is in that field unforgivable.
(At least, after having learned the lesson, also to behave better, I hope to
stay fake-free now till 2046).


So I end with the necessary: Mea maxima culpa,
and stay in silent contrition until I'll be allowed
to see the sun again..

Martin Altmann
Received on Sun 09 Jun 2013 08:33:41 AM PDT