(PCM) The Las Vegas area pawn shop featured in the History Channel series “Pawn Stars” is facing some heat after it has been revealed that they may have melted a man’s stolen coin collection.
The man, David Watkins, who has filed a criminal complaint with the State of Nevada claims that he coin collection, which he says is valued at over $50,000, was stolen from his home by his niece Jennifer Beckmen back in November of 2013.
Watkins claims that Beckmen stole the coins in installments and then on three separate occasions pawned the coins at the Las Vegas’ Gold and Silver Pawn shop and netted a profit of over $12,000.
Watkins claims that he attempted to contact the Gold and Silver Pawn shop to place a hold on the coins during the investigation, however he was unable to have the recovered. According to both Watkins and a representative from Gold and Silver Pawn too much time had passed for the coins to be recovered and they had most likely be melted down.
The owner discovered the coins had been stolen on November 27th and the shop was not notified until December 5th. While pawn shops are incredibly regulated by Nevada state law meaning that all customers must present valid identification and every item sold entered into a database that is regularly viewed by police and held for 30 to 90 days, an exception is made for coins. Coins are not considered to be jewelry and can therefore be disposed of by the shop whenever they choose.
A spokesperson for Gold and Silver Pawn claims that in shop that is as fast moving as theirs items are moved out very quickly. When coins arrive they are usually marked by a grader. If that grader is not someone trusted by the shop, the coins are broken out their plastic case and melted down. The spokesperson feels that is most likely what has occurred with the Watkins’ coin collection and that they were most likely not worth what he thought they were worth.
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