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A big surprise for those who read Connor Cochran’s response to the Conlan Press fraud scandal.

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We’re shocked and disgusted at what Connor just did.

To shift blame, this report was blamed on an ex-employee named Mike. Connor trashed him at length across the internet. We answered the attack with: TL;DR.  Here’s why: it had nothing to do with us. Non-sequitur. Irrelevant. Not Applicable.

Rich Johnston at Bleeding Cool – You’re a hero for standing up to cover this. But never trust Connor Cochran.

“Full Refunds Offered Over Last Unicorn Lateness, Connor Cochran To Sue Mike Bolger” – (Article now edited. We’re independently verifying ID with Rich.)

Connor’s friend- beware of white-knighting for frauds:

“Connor Cochran rebuts ex-employee’s allegations over Conlan Press product delays.”

Hey Connor:  You’ve been called out for 10 years of stealing. You responded by trashing an uninvolved bystander. What you wrote is very bad for you:  

A pseudonymous troll at “fansagainstfraud.com” is fixated on attacking Connor Cochran and Conlan Press. In real life he is a conspiracy theorist whose name is Mike Bolger. 

Everyone,

We’re Not Mike

It’s news retraction time. Our brief delay in letting you know was required for consulting lawyers. (Cochran has now been forced to heavily edit and remove his defamation against Mike- but we have it all screenshot.)

We never pretended to be Mike. We never mentioned his name or hinted it. We’re not trolling or doing a “thing”. He simply had nothing to do with this exposé of fraud. The leap to conclusions was 100% on the part of Connor, and his outrageously overwrought backlash about being called out.

We’d never known Mike, until Connor smeared his name all over the internet, all of his own accord.  (Sometimes outing people’s bad behavior happens as a last resort… it’s all one can do when a bully silences victims. But when Cochran smears people, that’s just the bully thing he does.)

Thank you, Connor, for revealing that there is more corroborating evidence about the fraud you do.

Thanks for revealing that you caused MORE people to suffer bad experiences, besides ones we already knew.

Thanks for validating complaints.

Thanks for showing how you act to get your way.  You don’t hesitate to throw innocent people under the bus, like you don’t hesitate to hurt loyal fans.  This story struck a nerve so much that you lashed out at an innocent target who hasn’t even spoken to you for years (according to your friend’s post). He likely would have done anything to avoid this mess you made.

Again, we never pretended to be Mike. We never mentioned his name or hinted it.  We didn’t know him.  We couldn’t read Connor’s mind about him.  We have nothing to do with Connor’s lashing out at him. (Sorry he went through that.)

Now this bystander was turned into collateral damage, against his will and ours – but this is revealing.  It goes to show what kind of bully Connor is, and what he does… and what we do to back our mission of fairness.

What Connor did is inexcusable.

If he chooses to bring a lawsuit, we’re putting money behind the countersuit.

We back our mission so sincerely, that we’ll pay for other victims of Connor Cochran to get fairness.

Everyone else who’s been abused, please share, and let’s be friends.

 

There’s a way out, Connor. We’re not sue-happy. People are just WRONGED.

Let’s have honest, transparent accounting about every fan you’ve hurt, and prove that it will never happen again. Time to come clean.

We ARE about fairness.  We’ll drop the issue if that happens, and stop publicizing it. 

People can change – but until now, all we’ve seen is rationalizing, excuses, and blame-shifting for Cochran’s bad behavior. Same old, same old.

Just to finish the topic – we did learn things from “unreliable narrator” Cochran’s INCREDIBLY DUBIOUS and TRANSPARENTLY SELF-SERVING recounting of stories. (Funny, how so many things supposedly quoted from others build super-convenient excuses. As if the quotes come from Cochran.)

Previously, we’d shared the Conlan Press attrition process, where a long chain of fake excuses helped push customer claims into limbo.  Many excuses blamed other people.

In Post #1, we talked about the “Smokescreen of employee abuse” – here it is.

Did Peter Beagle hear about this?  Now we get to a sad thing at the bottom of Cochran’s bag of tricks.  That’s for the coming post of “what you’re really hearing when you hear denial about this from Conlan Press.”

 

Bleeding Cool update: empty threats and backpedaling defense from Conlan Press.

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Our cause for consumer rights is blowing up!  Thank you, Bleeding Cool and Rich Johnston.  Update:

Full Refunds Offered Over Last Unicorn Lateness, Cochran To Sue Mike Bolger.

Believe it when you see it!  Let’s do a reality check: Conlan Press and Connor Cochran have a long history of refund promises that never happen.  Promised checks never arrive.  A small portion of customers put through the wringer of their claims attrition process have spent far more effort than a refund is worth to secure one.  So what does a promise mean?  As much as all the ones that came before it.

When Connor Cochran puts his money where his mouth is, countless customers have gone empty-handed.    

Bleeding Cool’s forum reacts:

Bleeding Cool often serves the community through its posts – by spotlighting indies, gender-crunching, noting charity opportunities and so forth – but outing people when they try to take advantage of others is my personal favorite, avid justice-porn lover that I am. Good on you again, Rich.

Deepest gratitude from us as well, Rich.  You’re a hero.  Without your help, and without this info coming out… every cheated fan would be isolated and powerless, thinking they were the only ones who paid for goods never received for 10 years.

It’s so encouraging to see Cochran FINALLY having to answer to the history of abuse.

Know this: Cochran’s public statement isn’t an honest action.  It’s a reaction to being Called Out.  It’s been forced out of him through public demand for fairness.  If he could have gotten away with it, he wouldn’t have said a thing at all.  Countless customers would have been left damaged. 

He’s on the defense now.  And man, does he have a lot to answer for.  Don’t forget the real reason for defense when you read this.  (Update: it is now heavily edited to remove a litany of abuse against innocent bystanders- but we’ve got it all screenshot.)

Connor Cochran shovels out another pile of bullshit about the scandal he caused.

Oh, Connor!  Outing your abuse certainly struck a nerve, didn’t it?

Readers: are you waiting for a response?  We’ve got the perfect one.  Later, when events have run their course, you can look back and nod:

TL;DR

You don’t know it yet, but you will.  This moment is one for the highlights reel.

Let’s cut through the bullshit. Here’s a bottom line fact:

Despite Connor Cochran’s cockiness about courts… if you see this site live, he doesn’t have a thing to do about it.  If he can’t get this site taken down, take it as a firm clue that Connor Cochran is lying.  This site reveals the truth of the scandal he caused.  We won’t be silent until fairness is won.  We PROMISE.

Them’s fightin’ words!

But let’s emphasize:  YES, we really ARE about fairness.

Our goals:

1) Every cheated customer is owed what they paid for, or a full refund.  NOW.  Not bait-and-switch.  Not digital download instead of manufactured goods.  Not another 10-year chain of broken promises.

2) Conlan Press owes full, transparent accounting to every cheated customer.  Come clean about who was cheated and how, and how it’s repairing damage done for 10 years.  Not a promise – an accounting.

3) It must not happen again. NO fake pre-sales of goods that won’t exist.

It’s not an easy task to expose a story that’s been suppressed and is crying for fair resolution. We ARE fans and do-it-yourselfers.  We aren’t professional muckrakers, or bringing “astroturf” support.  That’s the situation when David stands up to the Goliath of a connected business owner, power abuser, and bully.

Abuse caused by Conlan Press is their responsibility.  We aren’t afraid to publish the truth about it.  It’s far past time for fairness.  That’s what this site represents, as long as it’s live.

More info soon.

 

 

Bleeding Cool news blog and others react to Conlan Press fraud scandal.

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Bleeding Cool is a comics news blog with 3-4 million monthly views.  Founder Rich Johnston, “the oldest extant comics news reporter on the Internet”, covers this scandal and call for Consumer Rights:

Last Unicorn Publisher Targeted With Accusations Of Fraud

Rich’s story throws another failure on this Dumpster fire of a story caused by Conlan Press.  It adds evidence that Last Unicorn comic artists were also accused of non-delivery of work for years, on many other projects.  Customers who bought Last Unicorn comics can add that to the list of reasons why promises were broken.

Bleeding Cool forum members respond:

…for those who haven’t gotten the education either the easy or hard way yet: I would not give Ray Dillon, his wife Renae De Liz, or any organization affiliated with Connor Cochran any money prior to receiving something of value in return, not for yourself and not for charity. They are very good at playing on your desire to be sympathetic to whatever hardships or miscommunication they are presently claiming, but not about about getting people what they paid for in a remotely timely fashion, if at all. It’s an established pattern going back many years. You’ve been warned.

Bad partnership choice doesn’t necessarily reflect on an innocent person.  But with Connor Cochran’s choice to also work with an ex-lawyer disgraced for literary world fraud – and all the other reasons his reputation belongs at the bottom of a dumpster – how can we not assume the worst?  Now ask: how complicit is he with the artists’ history of bad behavior?

The forum raises a comparison to a notorious scammer who also pre-sold goods that were never delivered: “Connor Cochran is the Geoff Beckett of fantasy publishing.”

And a reader raises a comparison that will mean a lot to fans of The Last Unicorn.

“After reading thru the stuff I’m pretty convinced Peter Beagle is being Mommy Fortuna’ed by the publisher, Conlan Press.”

Mommy Fortuna’s carnival pimped sad, chained-up animals as pretend magic things, for a show that abused the little magic it did possess.  No refunds!  The analogy gets WAY too easy: The character is Twitter header for Peter Beagle’s sales manager.

Peter Beagle’s Twitter (which states it’s NOT managed by him, but by her,) supposes that naive, gullible fans will soak up a secondhand statement about this story like sparkles from a Unicorn’s ass.

On Twitter, proxied Peter says it’s all lies.  Everyone who didn’t get these 79 sales is supposed to be lying. “You can take my word for it.”  Conlan Press says that’s good enough… ignore inconvenient stuff posted here like EVIDENCE and CORROBORATION.

Watch this site for a new article soon, to learn what you’re really hearing when you hear denial about this from Conlan Press. 

 

More reader reactions:  link

 

Yep, I ordered this in 2005. Got nothing.

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Holy shit I just read through all of that on that site. Does this Author Peter Beagle not give a single shit about what this guy is doing?

I mean seriously what’s the deal with his silence? All I saw was “I’m not connected to the publishing house…” or some such craziness.

I mean from what I saw, this Connor Cochran douchebag had total control of his works and is dicking around people like this? Are you kidding me? Damn reading through all that pissed me off and I’m not even one of the ones that have bought anything.

I sure as hell will NEVER buy anything from those guys ever. Unless I just feel like throwing money down the crapper.

That asshole needs to give these people their money back or give them those deluxe last unicorn books, which it doesn’t even sound like there is any. And he needs to go the fuck to jail for swindling people out of unpaid wages as well as fraud.

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This year a friend and I went to a local screening of the Last Unicorn meet-the-author tour. We were extremely excited and it was a great experience at the time, we even dressed up in Lady Amalthea and Red Bull cosplays and put a lot of effort into them.

Connor Cochran was there with Mr. Beagle; he was extremely friendly and charismatic, telling us all about the cool tour book they planned to put together and would we be interested in having our cosplay photos in it? They would mail us movie filmstrip pieces with the characters we were cosplaying and everything. Naturally we were stoked, took lots of photos with the author, and gave our addresses.

We were told that the tour was going so well, they’d sold out of a lot of books. I ordered two that were missing as signed copies to be sent to me. Months have gone by now. According to their Facebook they’re having ‘unforeseen trouble sending the books across the border.’ I’ve sent many messages that have gone unanswered since the last update. Pretty sure I’m never getting my copies, and who knows if this tour book will ever materialize.