The truth , although slowly at times, always comes out in the end........
That it does.
I have to be very, very vague about this, due to giving my word not to divulge any specific or sensitive information in order to protect several wildly different sources who contacted me independently and discretely at different times, and who had no logical motivation to spread lies and falsehoods regarding this mess. Which makes me believe them, unlike the people who have contacted others here, trying to convince them that the auction piece is authentic.
Suffice it to say that I was made privy to several bits of inside information from the auction which made my Spider-Sense tingle like a small nuclear bomb. And any such inside information was already unnecessary to cast doubt on the piece, given the photographic evidence which we all eagerly examined in this thread.
More than that I cannot say, but take comfort in knowing that enough physical evidence has already been uncovered in this very thread (specifically, the modern-day replica parts) to prove beyond all doubt that the auction piece is a fake. A fake which was clearly and specifically manufactured for the purpose of defrauding the public and making a considerable amount of money at auction. And it worked. Which means that the integrity of this hobby has suffered. It’s really sad.
As for HC, note that they eventually did the right thing and entirely removed the phaser page and its endorsement from the site before it went down, indicating their level of involvement in this whole mess—do-gooders who ended up caught in the middle. I wouldn’t be too harsh on them, although their reputation has certainly been damaged by all of this. HC’s shocking, 180-degree turn from “Obvious fake! Let’s take action against it!” to ringing endorsement to dead silence and downed website should be a big clue that there were battles behind the scenes of this thing which led to their caving in and later abandoning ship, most likely due to threats of legal action. It seems pretty clear that something happened to make them do an about-face and then drop off the radar to escape from this mess.