B.C. men got scammed after spending $1,200 on Pokémon cards

Two B.C. men who paid more than $1,200 for a handful of Pokémon cards but received worthless cards in an alleged scam have won their case in the small claims court.

According to a Mar. 16 B.C. Civil Resolution Tribunal decision, Andrew Younes and Jalilzadeh Khiabani, paid Zachery Hall $1,235 for seven Pokémon cards, but only received a selection of cards worth a few cents.

The decision says Younes had previously bought Pokémon cards from Hall through a third-party intermediary.

However, on this occasion Hall asked Younes not be use the intermediary and to e-transfer him $975 directly.

Younes then got suspicious when he saw Facebook posts suggesting Hall had sold the same cards to other people.

He messaged Hall about this and Hall then "unsent" their message history including photos of the sold cards.

This added to Younes suspicions and luckily he'd screen-saved all the now-deleted messages.

The parcel arrived a few days later.

"By then Mr. Younes believed that Mr. Hall had scammed him, so he took a video of himself opening the box," the decision says. "The package included only a basketball card and a baseball card. There were no Pokémon cards at all."

The Tribunal accepted this video as evidence pointing to the fact the box is taped in the same way it was when Hall had taken a photo of the parcel before shipping it. The Tribunal also says it was opened 10 minutes after being picked up from the courier.

"I find it unlikely that Mr. Younes would have been able to open, repack, and reopen the package in that short amount of time," the Tribunal ruled.

The decision also named Celest Robinson along with Hall as defendants in the case, but the Tribunal stated that since all communication was with Hall, Robinson is not part of the case.

The decision also says Hall is facing several allegations of criminal activity and is involved in a B.C. Supreme Court action against the Director of Civil Forfeiture.

However, the Tribunal said because these are still just allegations, they are unrelated to this dispute.

Separately, Khiabani e-transferred Hall $260 for one Pokémon card but instead received 15 largely worthless cards.

While Khiabani didn't have the video evidence his friend had, the Tribunal still accepted his story.

The Tribunal said Hall's defence is "difficult to follow" and doesn't address the issue.

According to the decision, Hall also said Younes attempted to find other "disappointed buyers" on Facebook to join the small claims case which is "slanderous."

"It is unclear, however, whether (Hall's) denial is about their allegation that they received the wrong cards or their allegation that Mr. Hall is a 'scammer,'" the decision says. "Mr. Hall’s failure to provide an explanation of what happened, or to explicitly deny the applicants’ allegations, suggests that he knows he sent the wrong cards, whether it was on purpose or not."

With that, the Tribunal ordered Hall to pay Younes $975 and Khiabani $260 plus fees and interest.

READ MORE: Osoyoos man awarded $1,500 in small claims court after racist abuse, assault by neighbour

To contact a reporter for this story, email Ben Bulmer or call (250) 309-5230 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.

We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above.