Mystery fans? Name Richard Pierce ring any bells?

[strada5300]

Maybe I watch too much TV but there's a TV program here in the States called Cold Case and today when I was reading the ACOC Forum a name lept out at me from the past that made me want to dial the LAPD Cold Case lads.  The name was Richard Pierce.
   
   Back in the '70s (those days are extremely vague to me) I met this young hotshot lawyer in an upscale LA suburb called Encino. I was there to sell him car literature but all he wanted to do was show me his two 427 Cobras which he said he had ordered from the UK. He and a Chicago-based partner were paying somebody in LA to redo the interiors to they would be exactly like the Sixties CSX3000 cars and he planned to affix the SN (VIN) of real Cobras that had been crashed or were known to be destroyed.
   
   (Why people want to show me their dishonest schemes I'll never know.)
   
   
    But I digress. Only days after our meeting, Mr. Pierce, in true Los Angeles film noir style, caught a bullet, as they say,  and promptly expired. I never heard if the case was solved, and if so, if a motive was established. It might have had nothing to do with cars. But if it wasn't solved, my question for serial number chasers is:
   
   --did he successfully pass off the cars as originals so that there are five 427 Cobras out there that were from this batch?
   
   --Was there ever any investigation of the car scam in connection with his untimely demise?
   
   In the ACOC forum, what started me down the rabbit hole was a  mention of his and his partner's name in connection with a small block 289. I only saw two big block cars at Mr. Pierce's residence so I perhaps poorly concluded that they were all going to be alike.
   
   I haven't found out if there is a cold case squad in Los Angeles yet but the city is so broke they probably have a solitary individual dusting off the old files....and no doubt he has quite a backlog.

[aex125]

The 1997 SAAC registry shows CSX3231 as having been owned by Richard Pierce and also mentions his demise and his attempts to import Angliss Cobras with a partner. It doesn't answer your questions, but CSX3231 is still out there so maybe he owned a real one also?
   Jay

[Mark IV]

I assume his partner was Richard Buxbaum who at the time was based in Chicago (he was originally from Buffalo, NY). Buxbaum was the guy who got Angliss to build complete cars for sale in the USA. Several of the rollers imported were "CSX'd" at some point. If some were passed off and sold as original Thames Ditton cars, I can't say, but it would not surprise me in any way.

[TLegate]

I think the Feds gave this scam their close attention at the time...cars going out the back door etc etc. If you want to trace the cars (why?) start in Australia. Long story, best forgotten. Not a fine moment in automotive history. But goes some way to explain why 998 Cobras were built and all 1,200 still exist.....

[Mark IV]

quote:Originally posted by Trevor Legate
   
But goes some way to explain why 998 Cobras were built and all 1,200 still exist.....
   

   "this is a VERY rare Ferarri, they only built 5, I own all 8.............."[:D]