u/Scribblyr

150 years ago, uhm, maybe 5 weeks back, I opined that “Reckless” Ben Schneider oughta sue the pants off Ammon McNeff, personally, for a whopping $30 million.

Well, seems Ben Schneider has finally! read my Reddit post! Just kidding ;). Well, mostly kidding.

In my earlier post, I suggested a lawsuit against both Pricks & Minidicks Corporate, and Ammon McNeff as an individual, based on the smorgasbord of fantastical allegations this moostachioed micro-villain has made to Utah police. Two nights ago, in Schneider's latest YouTube salvo, our favourite, fearless court fool has - at long last - raised the spectre of a countersuit, hitting these Pricks right in their Minidicks, declaring that he'll seek “millions and millions of dollars” for all the “punitive damage”.

Schneider botched the legal terminology, yet again – it's millions in punitive damages, plural; not millions for punitive damage, singular – but the young man's intentions remain clear. Schneider even volunteered that his lawyers have told him he has a “slam dunk” case against the Pricks with the Minidicks that could “bankrupt their entire company”!

>So, wait, wait, wait. So, it's... Because they've caused so much like punitive damage, now. Like, they've put Brian on medication. He's been having panic attacks. They've tried ruining his whole life and all this other stuff. Now, it's a little bit more complicated than just giving the LEGOs back.
Now, basically, our lawyers are saying that this is going to be a slam dunk case. We could just get millions and millions of dollars out of them and, like, basically bankrupt their entire company. So, Bricks & Minifigs will get completely destroyed.

It's not hard to guess why seasoned civil litigators might salivate at the prospect of parading the perfidious practices of these prodigious pricks before a jury panel. We have effectively already held a global internet focus group of tens of millions of people telling us how that turns out! And it turns out people really, really, really hate these pricks! (while, possibly, maybe, kinda sorta sympathizing with them for being afflicted with those teensy minidicks.)

So, let's take a step back to look at “Reckless” Ben's possible next moves, how he can take a wrecking ball to the relationship between Pricks & Minidicks HQ and their beleaguered franchisees, and why Ammon McNeff should be shitting in the very pants that Ben is about to sue right off him.

In his new video, Ben once again expresses sympathy for the “innocent” Pricks & Minidicks franchise owners, who Ammon et al. are hurling under a double decker bus. Well, with one master stroke, Ben could simultaneously garner massive public props, show - yet again - his selfless nature, and drive a wedge between the Brothers McNeff and all their long suffering vassals.

Ben could declare to the public that - in the event of his legal victory - he will accept equity control of Pricks & Minidicks Corporate to satisfy any judgment in this lawsuit and then vest all shares of the P&M HQ entity in a trust to benefit franchisees.

What the fuck does that mean?

Basically, it means that if Ben wins the lawsuit and receives a punitive damages award large enough to bankrupt the company, he can actually just accept ownership of the company as compensation instead of money. He could then choose to turn that entity over to the Pricks & Minidicks franchisees. Obviously, Bryan Mansell should be paid out for pain and suffering, and expenses and legal fees will need to be covered, but it's easy enough to add all those caveats. And there's really no reason for Ben (or Bryan) not to do this. The lawsuit is unlikely to ever get to that point, and it would spark mad public relations buzz in the meantime with Ben going from a pseudo-Robin Hood figure to a literal - and legal! - Robin Hood.

And why should all of this scare the shit out of Ammon McNeff? Well, I covered that in my earlier posts here and here, but let me add one thing: In the past, Utah appeals courts have allowed punitive damages awards with a ratio of up to 9-to-1 (punitive vs. compensatory, i.e. punitive damages awarded on top of damages to compensate you for actual harm you suffered) in cases of “egregious” conduct like “intentional malice, trickery, and deceit”.

Intentional malice, trickery, and deceit??? Sound fucking familiar?!?!

In this case, the Pricks & Minidicks gang are accused of repeatedly telling fantastical lies to police in order to weaponize the cops into an armed response to arrest a documentary filmmaker who had exposed them for stealing the life savings of a sick, elderly grandfather who just wanted to sell his LEGO to help pay for the education of his grandchildren.

Egregious conduct? Check.

Even if such a massive punitive damages award were to come down on appeal, the mere public verdict at an eight figure level would likely doom the company (if they're not doomed already). In the 9-to-1 ratio case I linked above, the jury originally awarded 145 times the finding for actual damages - $145 million in punitive damages on a $1 million compensatory damages award. And that was against State Farm, a relatively well-respected insurance company.

Given the amount of unbridled hatred these people have engendered towards themselves - coming from regular folks all around the world - and how generally shady they've managed to look in everything they do, does anyone really think that an eight figure kick to the dick is firmly beyond the realistic?

Fuck no. As Reckless Ben might say, bring on the punitive damage!

That might be just one slightly sloppy sentence, but the suggestion that Reckless Ben plans to file multiple upcoming lawsuits in this fight - cases where he'd be the plaintiff, not merely a named party - could be huuuuuuuge.

The big question: Who would Reckless Ben be suing, if not Pricks & Minidicks Corporate?

Let's take a look:

Lawsuit #1? The American Fork Police Department and its officers, obviously.

Lawsuit #1, check.

Now, several individuals associated with Reckless Ben have valid claims to bring against the AFPD, AFPD cops or the city, but those claims can all be brought as part of one suit. Assume for a moment, that's how Team Reckless would proceed.

Who else might be the defendant in Lawsuit #2?

We have only one other potential grouping of defendants to consider: the pricks associated with Pricks & Minidicks. How about Minidick Johnson? Well, Reckless Ben already has small claims lawsuit against Joshua Johnson. It's not clear what would be accomplished by bringing Johnson, alone, into a full-blown civil action. So, who then?

The only other action to be brought,, so far as I can tell, is Pricks & Minidicks Corporate and all the pricks, with their miniature dicks, who've played a role in the campaign against Bryan Mansell and Reckless Ben Schneider - starting with Minidick McNeff.

But why do I think a Pricks & Minidicks countersuit be such a big move in this whole monstrous affair?

Mainly because several analyses, including this one and this one, suggest that Pricks & Minidicks isn't anywhere near the well-resourced corporate behemoth their posturing and threats of lengthy litigation imply.

Imagine Reckless Ben drops a $30 million lawsuit alleging false statements made to induce police to arrest him - $100,000 in actual damages and $29.9 million in punitive damages.

I'm not saying Schneider would win this lawsuit. I'm not saying we know for certain the facts would back up such a civil claim. But how would lawyers for Pricks & Minidicks grapple with the prospect that these claims might someday be put before a jury?

Think about it:

Between them, Minidick McNeff and Minidick Johnson made some extraordinary accusations against Schneider while overtly demanding that police step in to arrest him. Schneider claims McNeff accused him of threatening to burn down and / or shoot up the Pricks & Minidicks headquarters. The bodycam footage clearly shows both men accusing Schneider of sending someone into the Salem-Keizer store to threaten to murder the store manager and striking a financial arrangement with Bryan Mansell to be paid a portion of any funds recovered in place of Mansell's LEGO in exchange for harassing Josh Johnson and Brandon Best into paying up.

Now, if the questions before the jury in a coming civil trial were kept to relatively narrow ones - like whether Schneider defamed Pricks & Minidicks, or the individuals involved, by accusing them of criminal theft - then one can easily imagine a jury getting bogged down in the details of such an argument. The line between civil and criminal matters can be a hazy one. For theft by conversion - illegally appropriating property that you originally took possession of legally - you have to prove the accused knew they were not operating within their legal rights. Here, all the claims Pricks & Minidicks makes that Johnson and Best had no way of confirming who owns what enter into played. No matter how much you, or I, believe the evidence is a lock that these two asshats knew exactly who owned those LEGO, this is still a really high legal bar to meet.

But once you start hurling allegations the other way, the whole dynamic changes.

These guys will not be popular with a jury!

Heck, we've essentially run a jury pool focus group for this case via the internet, already. We know how this ends.

Ben Schneider is a remarkable gifted editor and storyteller. But it wasn't his talent for spinning a convincing yarn that made the whole world hate Josh Johnson and Ammon McNeff with the fury of a thousand suns. It was Johnson's mess of contradictions over whether he had the LEGO and whether he'd give them back them back, and McNeff's ever-shifting explanations over consignment deals in the franchise agreement and U-Haul rentals. And, of course, that psycho stare from Brandon Best.

Frankly, I think these fucks sealed their fate the moment the words "You stole the Legos!" slipped the thin, ugly lips of Minidick Johnson.

Any lawyer worth their salt has got to be terrified of the full facts in this scandal getting before 12 honest citizens.

And, if the company is genuinely teetering on the brink financially, how could Pricks & Minidicks not sue for peace in the face of such a threat?

Pricks & Microdicks keeps flaunting the atomic weapon needed to wipe them off the economic map.

“...an authorized LEGO® reseller...”

Stripping these scumbags of that “authorized reseller” badge of honour, a credential the company touts in the first line of every media release, would be a public rebuke that rattles the already shaken confidence of financiers, sounds the alarm to potential future franchisees, and warns collectors and customers alike that this company cannot be trusted.

At this point, it would be a corporate death knell.

And that's more than enough leverage to force these fuckers to end this horror show, tout suite.

Might the glimpse of a white flag we see rising from the ramparts of BAM’s Minibrick Castle be pegged to a recent perusal of Utah’s many laws (including multiple felonies) punishing acts of lying to police?

• Obstruction of justice - Utah Code § 76-8-306
• Providing false information to law enforcement - Utah Code § 76-8-506
• Interference with public servant / obstruction of lawful service - Utah Code § 76-8-301

I’m not saying Ammon McNeff broke the law.

I’m not saying Ammon McNeff committed any crimes.

I am saying that if I were a friend of Mr. McNeff, I’d be shitting LEGO bricks right now.

Two months ago, Bricks & Minifigs CEO Ammon McNeff found himself dealing with a truly vexing headache: some juvenile lil YouTube influencer bothering his friend of over 20 years and (confusingly) his employee (18s and 10s, Employee...? I thought these guys owned a franchise...?).

Today, Snidely WIMPlash awoke to find himself a global embarrassment on a level worthy of his moostache. As the poet said, when you lie down with dogs, you get fleas in your whisker wax.

But it’s McNeff’s own words on bodycam that should be giving him sleepless nights.

>“Mr. Schneider is just a YouTuber that got a hold of the story, and then went to this guy and said ‘Hey, if I can harass these guys, if I can do some stuff and get some money out of them, will you pay me some of that money?’”

Now, I’m not saying Ammon McNeff lied his ass off to police, buuuuut...

It seems mighty unlikely that the CEO of Bricks & Minifigs would have insider information on an illicit, clandestine pact between Ben Schneider and Bryan Mansell. And a deal Ben Schneider offered to get Bryan Mansell his Star Wars LEGO back in exchange for a cut? A cut of... what exactly? The Millennium Falcon?

Remember, at every stage, Schneider has said his preference is getting the physical LEGO back! What sense does that make if he has a secret deal with Bryan for a percentage of the score? So, Schneider’s a conniving extortionist, scam artist, but also patient and understanding enough to wait for his co-conspirators to sell their children’s toys on eBay before he gets his cut of the take?

This also directly contradicts the earlier statement by Josh Johnson:

>“[Bryan Mansell] hired this YouTuber, his name is Ben Schneider - he’s Reckless Ben - to harass us, to stalk us, vandalize the store.”

So, did Mansell hire Schneider, or did Schneider hire Mansell?

Bonkers batshit stuff. It can be tough to keep your stories straight when you’re pulling them out of your ass. And if this comment from McNeff was just conjured out of thin air, then it isn’t merely a material false statement of fact (eek!) but an outright fabrication.

>“He was the one who vandalized the store over the weekend.”

Now, I’m not saying Ammon McNeff lied his ass off to police, buuuuut...

Vandalism involves destruction of property. Ben’s friends hanging a sign on the abandoned store in Salem-Keizer Oregon did not damage any property.

And if anyone thinks McNeff might be saved here by Schneider getting charged for his semiotic suspension, consider that Oregon actually prosecutes vandalism under a broader “Criminal Mischief” statute. Criminal Mischief in the Third Degree (ORS 164.345) - the lowest grade of the charge - does also include tampering and interfering with property that causes “substantial inconvenience”. Problem for Ammon is that tampering requires “appreciable physical alteration or rearrangement of the property” (there was no alteration or rearrangement of the property) and “substantial inconvenience” would be, at minimum, an enormous stretch for hanging a sign on a permanently closed building!

>“...[they] threatened to kill her (the store manager)...”

Now, I’m not saying Ammon McNeff lied his ass off to police, buuuuut...

Does anyone find this even the least bit credible? Does this seem like Ben’s style, even in the slightest? I’d never heard of this guy before this scandal and even I can say with confidence that it obviously does not.

Setting that aside, the store is fucking covered in cameras! If this happened, why isn’t somebody in cuffs??? Lol. Again, even setting aside the obvious logical problems - like how do you know, or prove, that Ben had anything to do with whoever supposedly did this - if the police had a person on video threatening to murder a store manager, that would be a helluva lot easier to prosecute than the bogus stalking beef in American Fork.

>“They filed multiple small claims court claims against a completely separate entity, and they used fictitious names to do so.”

Now, I’m not saying Ammon McNeff lied his ass off to police, buuuuut...

Didn't we see all these guys on camera, literally throwing cash around, buying the LEGO sets from Bryan and hatching their scheme? I think we saw all these guys on camera, literally throwing cash around, buying the LEGO sets from Bryan and hatching their scheme! I seriously doubt that they then went and put made up names on the lawsuit.

And I know for sure know that deliberately registering your business in a manner that conceals the fact that it is not registered under the address publicly associated with that business isn't the flex you think it is. All it demonstrates is that you're a bunch of shady motherfuckers who knew all along they were gonna eventually get sued.

>“...[they] forged the manager’s signature...”

Now, I’m not saying Ammon McNeff lied his ass off to police, buuuuut...

While tricking the store manager into signing a gag contract might have been the single stupidest thing Ben has done in this entire escapade - and it does expose him to real criminal liability should a prosecutor choose not to see it as the silly prank it is - I don’t see how this could possibly be forgery.

You can’t claim someone committed a specific criminal act just because you suspect they may have arguably committed a completely different crime.

Yowza. It’s a lot.

Contradictions aside, though, it seems like many of McNeff’s dodgy claims pour forth first from the mouth of our favourite foul-mouthed flip-flopper, Josh Johnson. In fact, I think that up to a point, McNeff got sold a bill of goods by his good old friend Josh, and only once Ben’s first video dropped did he realize how much he’d let himself buy into the bullshit.

McNeff and Johnson may go way back, but they have an odd relationship. Johnson is supposed to be a Bricks & Minifigs franchisee. He owns at least two stores. Or... owned. But Josh told police he’s an employee of Bricks & Minifigs corporate (18s). And McNeff confirms (10s).

And this employee seems to have even bigger problems with the truth than his Patreon-rebuked patron.

>“The previous lady, Crystal Law, owned [the store]. She calls corporate and says ‘I’m abandoning my store. Corporate, can you take over?’”

Ya, people abandoning their business always need to be frog-marched out the door under threat of arrest.

>“[Crystal] had a consignment deal with a guy named Bryan Mansell. A year and a half, almost two years, she had this consignment deal with him, and she never paid him.”

Uuuuuh, the guy supposedly not gettin’ paid has something else to say about that.

>“We show up, and [Bryan Mansell’s] like ‘Hey, you gotta pay me out on this consignment deal.’”

I think we’ve pretty well established that, the guy just wanted his fucking LEGO back.

>“And we’re like ‘Well, what do you mean?’ and then the corporate said ‘If there’s a consignment deal, we’ll handle it.’”

Talk about saying the quiet part out loud!!!!!!!!!

Folks, I think all this shit is very likely why Josh got “parted ways” from Bricks & Minifigs.

Imagine, just for example, that you’d set your good buddy up in a well-paid job in the company you’d bought and built up with your brother. The gig even comes with an added perk: swooping in to buy up other people’s businesses for pennies on the dollar whenever corporate HQ decided to relieve one of their franchisees of his or her lifesavings.

Now, imagine this trusted friend and lackey has been telling you for months about these crazy kids who’ve been giving him a hard time. He feeds you stories about a signature that his store manager claims was forged; exaggerates her baseless claim of feeling threatened into a threat of murder; embellishes hanging a scrim into an act of vandalism; speculates that maybe this one might have paid that one, or that one paid this one, and it’s all a damn conspiracy, dammit! Maybe he even hides from you the fact that he’d stiff-armed the sick old man’s son who only wanted his LEGO returned intact, or maybe he even kept selling the merchandise after he knew it wasn’t his. Maybe he even spun you a yarn about shutting down his store ’cuz those damn meddling kids had just gone too far, all to cover for the fact he’s petrified to answer for his actions in court.

And now imagine, those embellishments and exaggerations and secrets blow up your life in such spectacular fashion that not even all your money can keep you from feeling like a national punchline.

Imagine realizing how scared your friend looks and sounds every time he learns the threat of a lawsuit is real.

Imagine trying to imagine why he’s so frightened - and what he has to hide.

And then imagine, on top of all that, it dawns on you that you’ve parroted this mook's whole bullshit story to the cops...

As if it were true.

As if you knew it to be true.

That “friend” gets fired.

Fired right out of your tiny LEGO pirate ship cannon.

Sources:

https://www.reddit.com/r/RecklessBen/comments/1tw9b06/brandon_lies_to_police_about_reason_they_seized/

https://www.reddit.com/r/RecklessBen/comments/1tw2afj/this_video_hasnt_been_posted_yet_bam_explains/

https://www.reddit.com/r/RecklessBen/comments/1tw1gso/hypocrite/