By Jay Warren
WSLS10 Anchor
Published: March 26, 2008

The rooms are packed up and the chairs stacked. Compared to Tuesday, things were a little quieter on the fourth floor of the Holiday Inn Wednesday morning.

Anderson, Carter, Tira and Associates packed up half their operation after having rented most of the floor for their gold, silver and jewelry expo. Why? After our initial story and several calls for concerned citizens, Roanoke County Police went to the Holiday Inn Wednesday morning. They discovered the group was operating without the proper license to buy jewelry.

They don’t need a license to buy coins, so that portion stayed at the Holiday Inn. The jewelry half of the operation moved the Ramada Inn in Roanoke City which was the original location for the expo so they had a license.

Ten on your side kept digging and discovered several more developments. First, these buying groups seem to be multiplying. There’s a new organization at the Holiday Inn. It’s called Cashtown Estate Buyers and they’ll be in town Wednesday through Friday.

“We built our business on honest, trust and integrity,” said Paul Mullenix, the owner of Cashtown.

Mullenix and his staff have been to Roanoke before, with their last visit occurring at the end of September. Roanoke County Police have not had any complaints about the business. But Mullenix has some problems with this visit: his scales.

Here’s what he told us.

MULLENIX: “We were certified through Pennsylvania and then they would come in and calibrate our scales here and put a sticker saying we’re certified.”

WARREN: “Who would normally do that here locally?”

MULLENIX: “The Agriculture Department.”

But Mullenix did not get that sticker. In fact, state inspectors found his two scales unsuitable for commercial use.

“Those scales were not approved for the use that they were being used for,” said Will Fritz, a team leader for the Virginia Weights and Measure Department. They labeled Mullenix’s original scales unusable and advised him to buy new scales that would have to be tested before he used them. 

Inspectors were in Roanoke Wednesday thanks to our initial inquiry. Up until then, they had no idea these groups were here. And keep in mind, neither group should have started business in Roanoke County or Roanoke City until their scales were inspected locally. That’s state code.

Inspectors found the 10 scales for Anderson, Carter, and Tira, the first group here, to be accurate. They now have the Virginia seal on them and a date noting when the scales passed inspection. That seal is something you should look for in these situations.

The Better Business Bureau has not received any complaints about Anderson, Carter, and Tira Estate Buyers.