Kenneth Fetterman is an American

scam artist A scam, or a confidence trick, is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using a combination of the victim's credulity, naivety, compassion, vanity, confidence, irresponsibil ...

who occasionally partnered with Kenneth Walton to sell very expensive counterfeit art on rigged auctions on

eBay eBay Inc. ( , often stylized as ebay) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that allows users to buy or view items via retail sales through online marketplaces and websites in 190 markets worldwide. ...

. One of his partners in the

shill A shill, also called a plant or a stooge, is a person who publicly helps or gives credibility to a person or organization without disclosing that they have a close relationship with said person or organization, or have been paid to do so. Shills c ...

bidding was Kenneth Walton, who had, in May 2000, sold a fake painting that was at the time the highest price ever paid for a painting in an

online auction An online auction (also electronic auction, e-auction, virtual auction, or eAuction) is an auction held over the internet and accessed by internet connected devices. Similar to in-person auctions, online auctions come in a variety of types, with ...

. It was supposedly the undiscovered work of the late Northern California artist

Richard Diebenkorn Richard Diebenkorn (April 22, 1922 – March 30, 1993) was an American painter and printmaker. His early work is associated with abstract expressionism and the Bay Area Figurative Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. In the late 1960s he began ...

. However, the fraud was discovered, and after Walton was investigated, it was uncovered that Walton, Scott Beach, and Fetterman were involved in a shill bidding ring and that Fetterman had faked many paintings. After running from the authorities using various aliases and living off his fake paintings he was selling on eBay, he was finally caught indicted by a

federal grand jury Grand juries in the United States are groups of citizens empowered by United States federal or state law to conduct legal proceedings, chiefly investigating potential criminal conduct and determining whether criminal charges should be brought. ...

for rigging art auctions on eBay. In May 2004, Fetterman was sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison.Melley, Brian
"California eBay scam artist sent to federal prison"
''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (often stylized in all caps) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth in 1980 and launched on September 14, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headq ...

,'' 2004-05-27, URL retrieved 2006-12-13.

Notes

Other references

* Art forgers American cybercriminals 21st-century American Jews Living people American people convicted of fraud Year of birth missing (living people) {{crime-bio-stub