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Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

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Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#251

Post by shadefinale »

everforward wrote: post #238
shadefinale wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part 2's corruption and civil rights violations makes Part 1 look irrelevant. A lot of the coverage on this is still about the $200k and the lego sets. Fun part to mention is the officer that takes the subpoena to the would-be defendant is the part of the 3rd set of cops that were sent to Ben's non-moving car that is on public property. The cop's bodycam discussion with the would-be defendant is also fully redacted,…

> After telling Ben that the defendant doesn't accept the subpoena (can you even refuse being served like that?) They can't, and I'm surprised the officer wasn't aware of that. Confirm the person's ID, hand them the papers or sit them somewhere and tell them, they have been served. Process-wise, all that matters is confirmation to the court that the person is aware of and was given possession of the documents. If the…

I didn't mention it in the comment you replied to, but during this whole event including the 4 instances of police, Ben is in a car with a process server he hired to serve the papers. Ben himself stayed on public property the whole time.

The cops even tell Ben to get a process server, and he points out to the cops that yes, he has brought the exact person they described, she's right there in the car with him.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#252

Post by frmersdog »

Ajedi32 wrote: post #104
frmersdog wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The legal system is captured by legal professionals. The average American is bound by a system that they can't engage directly with. The middlemen who most people must hire to navigate through it generally will not help unless there's a substantial payday in it for them. And in civil matters, defendants have no right to representation. (Also, the judge is colleagues with counsel, opposing or otherwise; none of them t…

You correctly identify the problem as an over-complicated legal bureaucracy in your first paragraph, and propose more government as the solution in your third? The solution here should be to simplify the legal system so legal adjudication is more accessible to non-lawyers, not add more layers of government bureaucracy on top of the existing ones.

?

The bureaucracy is not the body of law or the judiciary, which were the only government-related targets of my criticism. I agree that the legal system needs to be more accessible to non-lawyers. At the heart of that grievance is the professionalization (read: privatization) of the legal field, which turned a tool for finding justice, despite disputes into a career pursued for prestige and wealth. The problem is that the law and the people who adjudicate it have been captured by private enterprise. The bureaucracy is, like... the court clerks. Who I don't have a problem with, they're quite helpful.

In fact, they'd be integral to this "simplification of the legal system", since what that's essentially asking for is not to make adjudication more accessible, but to move disputes out of adjudication into a procedural venue (where the rules are simple, everyone knows them, and you either follow them and win, or don't and get the hammer).

Across all of the examples - legal recourse, healthcare, housing - what you're looking at is the end of the ambiguity of paradigms driven by private companies with opaque policies and conflicts of interest, and the arrival of an institutional monolith which can be changed by voting in elections. They don't even have to have a monopoly, they just have to be there as an option. I suppose policing is the exception, and while the vision there is unbundling instead of bundling, you're still looking at wresting control for social services out of the hands of the professionals who have captured it.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#253

Post by wgjordan »

paulddraper wrote: post #23

For the alternate side, Bricks and Minifigs claims much of Mansell's inventory had been sold, or relocated by Mansell himself. The liability for any discrepancy in sales and his compensation is the responsibility of the franchisee with whom he sign the contract. > It was clear the full list of inventory in his documentation was not located in the store. What items could be reasonably identified as allegedly belonging…

Looks like a more detailed followup statement was just posted today:

https://bricksandminifigs.com/blog/blog/2026/05/28/bricks-mi...

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#254

Post by hedora »

If the allegations in the article are true (doxxing the victim, leading to injury), "losing" the contract, refusing to accept delivery of a copy of the contract, etc, etc, the corporation is clearly acting in bad faith. This is so egregious that pain and suffering would likely enter into any judgement. In the US, that means punitive multipliers on a high base value.

DDG's LLM-thingy estimates a $1.5M-$5M judgement if the judge is in a sufficiently bad mood, or a $10-50M jury award that'd be reduced on appeal.

I'm hoping they get the high range of those estimates.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#255

Post by bena »

cogogo wrote: post #168
bena wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cloud City 10123 is 698 pieces. That would've retailed for around $70-$90 new. It is worth roughly $10,000 sealed in box. I have some of the original Lego Star Wars sets. All opened and built and etc. Including this one which I purchased for like $5 or $10 https://www.ebay.com/itm/198386156944 I also have the only Deadpool figure Lego ever put in a set that goes for $75 or $100 by itself. It was in a $20 set. So the…

Wow. I do not want to knock collectors but I will never understand them. That particular set worth 10k looks kind of crappy to me. I understand the star wars crossover appeal but still. And I have three kids and have bought countless sets. Every bday and xmas times 3.

This set is expensive mostly due to rarity.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#256

Post by munk-a »

crazygringo wrote: post #235
A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that hard to understand. A man gave a store merchandise on consignment, signed a contract with the store manager. The manager lost control of the store to corporate. The goods were still there, still on display and being sold. Corporate says, "this is mine now" and refuses to honor the contract. "It wasn't our name on it, says right here that the previous store manager signed this, and she's no longer with u…

But the end of the blog post says the man sued and won . But the store closed to get out of paying. Which makes no sense if the store was corporate-owned. So why isn't the corporation paying?

The store in question was a franchise so potentially the liability will be limited to just the assets of that franchise. But there's a lot of weird stuff here and it looks like the corporation may have (in a legally questionable manner) removed assets from the store to the corporation during proceedings to shield them.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#257

Post by jonlucc »

thevinter wrote: post #239
jonlucc wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't watched this particular video, but I've read her 46 page suit. That's not the case that was lost. The case(s) that were lost are small claims actions made by the YouTuber and 9 of his friends, essentially. They got default judgments from the court on 10 claims each worth $10k. The previous owner's suit was just filed in March of this year, I believe. Now as for the previous question of who was at the pointy…

Oh yeah sorry, I misunderstood the suit the comment was referring to. It is my understanding that BAM took direct ownership of the local store and therefore the small claims case was also directed against them, but at the moment I can't find where I've heard that so I'm not 100% sure.

According to the former store owner's lawsuit, and what comports with what I've seen in the original video, the store was seized by corporate and then sold quickly to the owners of the Eugene, OR BAM store.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#258

Post by hedora »

crazygringo wrote: post #230

> Then Bricks & Minifigs Corporate took control of the Salem location from the original franchise owner > They were found liable in court. They closed the store rather than pay. This doesn't make any sense. If the corporation took control of the franchise, the corporation now owns it and its obligations. They can close the store if they want, but that doesn't do anything about their obligation to pay. What's missing…

If they were smart, they took the "inventory" as payment for some imaginary debt, bankrupting the store without taking ownership of it.

Hopefully, the courts will see through that tactic, and add a contempt charge on top of all the civil penalties.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#259

Post by pigeons »

usehand wrote: post #107
solomonb wrote: post #71

Can anyone explain WHY a 400M company would do this? This is just bonkers. They are destroying their reputation for $200k of legos???

The likely explanation is not that they are stupid, but that they are actually being rational and they can do this often and get away with it.

Its a different kind of rational though. There is a world leader who gets away with all kinds of obvious theft and bribery and grift and fraud and self-serving out in the open, but to reasonable people, he doesn't seem rational at all, despite getting away with everything.

Re: Bricks and Minifigs Stole a Man's $200k Lego Collection

#260

Post by trehalose »

jawns wrote: post #114

Unless the entire corporation files for bankruptcy, they can't just shut down a store to avoid paying a debt, much less a court judgment. There's clearly something else going on here that the blog post is either intentionally leaving out or grossly misunderstanding.

They can't nullify the debt by shutting the store down, but can they shut it down to create further headaches and delays for the person trying to collect the debt?
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