Hasn't "Antiques Road Show" been busted for inflating values and trying to help hoodwink insurance companies?
I thought it was undervaluing and buying the goods.
Maybe google will help us.
One famous segment involved a rather nondescript sword brought onto the show in 1997. The owner claimed to have used it, in his youth, to slice watermelons. Appraiser George Juno excitedly declared the sword a remarkable Civil War find worth $35,000, and instructed the bewildered owner to handle it in the future only while wearing white gloves. This was classic “Roadshow” -- an unassuming piece of rust, brought in by an owner who figured “What the hell; guess I’ll see if this is worth anything,” turns out to be a portable Brinks truck.
Trouble is, that quintessential segment was faked. The Boston Herald recently investigated; turns out, the appraiser had orchestrated the entire appraisal. This wasn’t Joe Q. Public stumbling onto an attic goldmine; this was a scheme by a businessman to cook up some free publicity for himself.
This is not the first time that ethics questions have dogged the pair. In June 1999 Pritchard and the AOPA were found liable in federal civil court of defrauding George Pickett V over artifacts of his ancestor, the famous general who made the futile charge at Gettysburg, artifacts that Pritchard purchased for $87,500 and were later sold for over $850,000.
"Hasn't "Antiques Road Show" been busted for inflating values and trying to help hoodwink insurance companies?"
I know a few of their appraisers have been busted for giving low appraisials on air, and later approaching that guest offering to buy their stuff.