The man who acted as the spokesman for the alleged 8,000 ct. stone billed as the world’s largest diamond still believes it exists—despite a bizarre incident where the people who promised to show him the diamond instead produced a lump of plastic.

“I truly believe [the diamond] is still out there,” South African businessman Brett Jolly told JCK. “If they were going to scam or con me out of money [for the property I was buying], they would have used the same piece of glass or plastic all the way through the scam. Why use a gemstone first and then a piece of plastic afterwards. … My logical question is: Why use two different fakes?”

He adds: “The miners signed a contract with me and Mr. [Ernie] Blom [president of the World Federation of Diamond Bourses]. They even reported the stone to the Ministry of Mining.”

When Jolly was supposed to be shown the “diamond,” the landowners used a diamond tester which, he discovered, had a cap on and was set on manual. “I tried it on my watch, windscreen, and leather coat. … Everything was a diamond,” he says.

He has since gone to the authorities: “I have got the police and authorities involved,” he says. “There are some very heavy hitters from the S.A. authorities investigating. The authorities think the stone may have been spirited out of the country.”