DEMING, Wash. – A Whatcom County man is facing a theft charge for selling a man a gold bar that turned out to be fake.
Whatcom Superior Court records show that a man agreed to meet Richard H. Ederer at a market at Nugents Corner last May to buy a gold bar Ederer had advertised on Craigslist.
Ederer offered the one ounce bar he claimed was pure gold for $1200, well below gold’s market price of $1890 per ounce at the time.
He told the man he had received the bar from his late father’s estate.
The man later melted a gold covering off the bar and found worthless metal underneath.
A sheriff’s department investigator went to Ederer’s address and found the father very much alive and he denied giving his son any gold.