For all things there comes a time, and now is the time to return to the ongoing scandals at UltimateBet and Absolute Poker, in a continuing attempt to out all of the crooked people involved. This time out we take a bit of a detour and explore not one of the corporate bigwigs, but rather the bit player whose personal greed ended up outing Russ Hamilton as one of the primary cheats behind the UB mess.
Hamilton's involvement became apparent after a series of posts on the 2+2 poker forums by an account called Brainwashdodo, which was posting from Costa Rica, where by 2008 (and the appearance of these posts) the call center for the combined UB/AP operation was located. Brainwashdodo's posts were suspicious from the start, not because of the explosive data within but because of the veiled threat attached that there was much more that would soon be released. It was as if 2+2 was being used as a tool of blackmail, and sure enough, the posts from Brainwashdodo soon stopped, with only Hamilton directly outed as a cheating conspirator, even though indications pointing to several others were also present.
And now, in true Paul Harvey fashion, the rest of this particular sideline story.
I've accumulated lots of sources during the past three years of investigating and writing these and other pieces, on both sides of the UB/AP aisle. People who think that such-and-such a person must be "my source" are just wrong, because my work has been an assemblage from at least a dozen well-placed people... even if none of them ever knew the whole story about everything, due to the incredibly tangled net that was in play. But as for brainwashdodo, I soon received little pieces -- first from one source, than a second... then a third. The name, the background, the story behind brainwashdodo, it all came out in little bitty chunks. He was described to me first as a $3.50 an hour customer service rep with a clue -- he knew that the stuff he had was dangerous... and it seemed he'd cooked up a plan to personally profit from a chaotic situation.
Later on I got his full name, then still later supporting documentation for the blackmail attempts. And yet I held back -- because what if it was somehow forged? The hardest of the documentation itself was received from an anonymous source, too, creating another set of concerns. I needed to know that this was indeed the story behind brainwashdodo beyond any reasonable doubt, and today, at last, that final glimmer of doubt has been removed. I will not publish that documentation quite yet, but I will say I am in possession of both brainwashdodo's personal work resume and background, and an e-mail exchange between he and Paul Leggett regarding potential "compensation" for brainwashdodo's info. I was 99.44% sure the stuff was legit anyway, but after reading a transcript forwarded to me earlier today, it's time to open it up for everyone.
That transcript was from a recent Donkdown Radio podcast were Micon and Druff were graced by a phone call from the mysterious Travis Makar, who has often been described in scandal-related postings as Russ Hamilton's right-hand man, though some of the stuff I've been told painted a different tale. I've read the transcript, and it is indeed the real Travis Makar, as he mentioned a couple of specifics that no one other than the real Makar would know. They are also different specifics than those confirmed by Mookman and RolloTomasi, who were present in the chat room during the conversation. Be it also stated here that while I have -many- sources, none of those to date include Travis Makar, unless he's one of the two or three anonymous ones that have still provided credible data. To the best of my knowledge Makar had gone completely and utterly to ground, though that now seems not to be the case.
Okay, enough of the foreshadowing and teasing. It's time to get on with.
Based on all of the evidence at hand, I can no longer see any reasonable doubt nor need to delay publication. Brainwashdodo's real identity is Zoltan Rozsa, a presumed former AP customer service worker. Rozsa is a Hungarian national who worked in Canada for several years, working as a tour guide and carpenter before becoming involved in the online-poker world, and he relocated to Costa Rica to continue working with AP.
Now on to the real dirty stuff. When the cheating scandals broke, Rozsa somehow came into possession of many incriminating documents, though I now know he was far from the only one to do so. A lot of people were (rightfully) interested in covering their own ass, and a lot of people are still sitting on caches of important information. Rozsa was not, to my knowledge, the only customer-service rep to make copies of suspicious activity, and of course many of the bigger names already linked to the scandal had their own reasons to save things as well.
But unlike many of the others, Rosza at some point decided to make use of his knowledge for personal profit. The story I was told, long before I ever received any hard documentation, went like this:
1) Rozsa went to CEO Paul Leggett looking to get beaucoup bucks in exchange for his cooperation;
2) Leggett gave the matter some thought, but decided not to pay. Leggett instead decided to try to intimidate Rozsa by hiring some thugs to sit in a parked car outside Rozsa's apartment;
-- Aside: For those of you thinking the above is beyond the pale, just let it sit for a few posts, and we'll come back to it at some point and see if it makes sense. There were some strange things going on in Costa Rica, including a couple of pathetically hilarious Scott Tom anecdotes I've yet to share.
3) Rozsa, turned down by Leggett, gets hold of Russ Hamilton instead. Hamilton recognizes that he's already burned and that there's worse dirt to come out, and he immediately calls Leggett and says, "Are you crazy?? Do you realize what he has?" In any event, though, it's Hamilton that pays some amounts to Rozsa, and Rozsa duly ceases posting on 2+2.
I had been told by one of my most trusted sources that Hamilton initially paid Rozsa $80,000 in 2008, although Travis Makar in his Donkdown call-in said that no, 80 grand was the amount Leggett wanted to give Rozsa, Rozsa wanted more, and that Hamilton paid some other amount. I have also been told that Rozsa went back to Hamilton in 2010 for a second helping and received some smaller additional payment. I have not been able to verify this from additional sources, however, though I believe it to be true.
Indeed, a lot of the apocryphal tales I've been told still need verification, though I've been able to confirm many things not yet published. It was interesting to read Makar's account of the thugs parked outside Rozsa's apartment, because I'd heard that from a source not close to Makar. While it's not proof, it's unusual to hear the same story i two different ways.
What I can verify, however, is the nature of the exchange between Rozsa, who went by the tag "Zola", and Leggett. Leggett began his denial by writing, "I was thinking about it over the weekend and I have decided to not pay the extortion money." However, the exact nature of the information nor what the proposed business arrangement Rozsa had in mind is not included in the portion of the exchange I have received. What is included, though, is that Leggett slammed the door by reporting Rozsa to the authorities, these being rather more real authorities than those purportedly notified by the Mohawks of Kahnawake in their hilarious cover-up efforts.
Leggett wrote this to Rozsa:
"I have submitted reports of your crimes to the OIJ." The OIJ is the Organismo de Investigación Judicial, Costa Rica's version of the FBI. (Whether or not Leggett actually did notify the OIJ is of course another question.)
Anyhow, knowing that the information I have is indeed legit and that the information brainwashdodo holds is also possessed by others, it's time to swing the hammer again and knock down another wall. Let's see where the rats scurry this time.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
On Reid and Online Poker
I'll be serving up various and sundry comments over at the KAP blog regarding this highly important topic. While most of us have highly charged opinions on the matter, there's really very little we can do at this point, because the plans have been set in motion by forces beyond poker players' control. We'll just have to continue hanging on to the tiger's tail at this point and see what the next week or two will bring.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Been Playin' a Bit... For a Change
True 'nuff, I've been playing quite a bit of cards the last two or three weeks, mostly poker but with a little bit of cribbage mixed in.
Poker's been resurgent mostly because of a hot day last Saturday in which I made six final tables and took down three of the six, along with a nice handful of SNG showings throughout the day; I fire those up continuously to keep the screens full. None of the scores were individually noteworthy but they did puff the old BR up to a more playable level.
Of course, the Curse of the Flambeau lives on: Whenever I try to play poker live at the Lake of the Torches Casino in northern Wisconsin, karma craps on me. The latest ridiculous beat was building a $150 buy-in up to about $220, then getting it all in with A-A against A-K on a K-Q-x, two-spade flop. He had the king of spades, and duly hit his 1-in-26 runner-runner, though since two other kings were out I was only something like a 91:9 fave when the money went in. At least getting aces cracked there is worth $25, consolation pittance that it is.
Doom. Doom. Doom-de-doom-doom. Thanks for da bad beat. Goodbye, $430 pot.
But, it could be worse. I returned home Saturday after a Turkey Day half-weekend in the northwoods and basically won it all back, so we'll chalk it up to variance. Two more final tables in better tourneys, though just a tenth and a third to show for the runs. (I'll take 'em.)
And an interesting start to today. I fired up the computer and played a handful of small tourneys and SNGs, and ran into a couple of French players blatantly colluding in a 6-player SNG. Never playing big pots against each other while taking turns jamming against me and other players with crap, that sort of thing. I'm slow at times, but I figured it out after about the twelfth straight move when we got down to three-handed, me against the two cheaters. We'll see if the site does anything about it, since the overall pattern could not have been more blatant. I still lasted long enough to beat one of the two before losing a race against the other.
As for the cribbage stuff, I've settled down into a pattern of taking one weekend a month and floating off to some locale within a four- or five-hour drive and playing a full ACC-sanctioned event, which generally means playing 50 or so games between Friday night and Sunday afternoon. Between that and my local grass roots league I've been on a solid run for about six months. That can be variance, too, but cribbage is about as complex a two-person card game as there is, and I've studied hard the last year or so to try and improve my game. Millions of people know how to play cribbage, but there are only a few hundred really great cribbage players, and I'm trying to join them, a process that probably takes several years. (Besides, it serves as a break from poker on the rare occasions that that world gets to be too much.) One problem is that unlike in poker, there are no great cribbage books from which to study. There is one pretty good one (Colvert), a few so-so ones, and some that are just junk.
Therefore, onward. Folks notice I continue to write this and that and the next, and I'm also looking for a few better sites to do some link exchanges with regarding the two new sites I'm writing for, both of which I believe offer distinctive content. Send an e-mail if you have interest in this.
Poker's been resurgent mostly because of a hot day last Saturday in which I made six final tables and took down three of the six, along with a nice handful of SNG showings throughout the day; I fire those up continuously to keep the screens full. None of the scores were individually noteworthy but they did puff the old BR up to a more playable level.
Of course, the Curse of the Flambeau lives on: Whenever I try to play poker live at the Lake of the Torches Casino in northern Wisconsin, karma craps on me. The latest ridiculous beat was building a $150 buy-in up to about $220, then getting it all in with A-A against A-K on a K-Q-x, two-spade flop. He had the king of spades, and duly hit his 1-in-26 runner-runner, though since two other kings were out I was only something like a 91:9 fave when the money went in. At least getting aces cracked there is worth $25, consolation pittance that it is.
Doom. Doom. Doom-de-doom-doom. Thanks for da bad beat. Goodbye, $430 pot.
But, it could be worse. I returned home Saturday after a Turkey Day half-weekend in the northwoods and basically won it all back, so we'll chalk it up to variance. Two more final tables in better tourneys, though just a tenth and a third to show for the runs. (I'll take 'em.)
And an interesting start to today. I fired up the computer and played a handful of small tourneys and SNGs, and ran into a couple of French players blatantly colluding in a 6-player SNG. Never playing big pots against each other while taking turns jamming against me and other players with crap, that sort of thing. I'm slow at times, but I figured it out after about the twelfth straight move when we got down to three-handed, me against the two cheaters. We'll see if the site does anything about it, since the overall pattern could not have been more blatant. I still lasted long enough to beat one of the two before losing a race against the other.
As for the cribbage stuff, I've settled down into a pattern of taking one weekend a month and floating off to some locale within a four- or five-hour drive and playing a full ACC-sanctioned event, which generally means playing 50 or so games between Friday night and Sunday afternoon. Between that and my local grass roots league I've been on a solid run for about six months. That can be variance, too, but cribbage is about as complex a two-person card game as there is, and I've studied hard the last year or so to try and improve my game. Millions of people know how to play cribbage, but there are only a few hundred really great cribbage players, and I'm trying to join them, a process that probably takes several years. (Besides, it serves as a break from poker on the rare occasions that that world gets to be too much.) One problem is that unlike in poker, there are no great cribbage books from which to study. There is one pretty good one (Colvert), a few so-so ones, and some that are just junk.
Therefore, onward. Folks notice I continue to write this and that and the next, and I'm also looking for a few better sites to do some link exchanges with regarding the two new sites I'm writing for, both of which I believe offer distinctive content. Send an e-mail if you have interest in this.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Review Site Now Up
Hey, all, we're live at last! As I've previously mentioned, I've been working on a series of poker reviews for a revamped site specializing in just that -- serving up reviews of the best poker books around. My work is now appearing at thepokerbookstore.com, where a dozen or so of my reviews can already be found.
The site's focus will be poker strategy books, though we'll sneak in the occasional non-strat book as well. We will continue to add new reviews to the site at the rate of two or three per month, along with other special features and items of interest.
We've started things off with a list of "Poker Essentials" -- a sampling of poker books that any self-respecting poker library ought to contain. In the future we'll be adding more and newer books, though we'll continue to go back and sample the worthy classics, of which at least a few dozen are worth revisiting. And we won't be afraid to warn you off of bad books, either, with one of the new reviews already on the site dealing with a recent offering that should never have been written.
Questions? Comments? Link inquiries? Books for reviews? Feel free to contact either the site or me directly.
The site's focus will be poker strategy books, though we'll sneak in the occasional non-strat book as well. We will continue to add new reviews to the site at the rate of two or three per month, along with other special features and items of interest.
We've started things off with a list of "Poker Essentials" -- a sampling of poker books that any self-respecting poker library ought to contain. In the future we'll be adding more and newer books, though we'll continue to go back and sample the worthy classics, of which at least a few dozen are worth revisiting. And we won't be afraid to warn you off of bad books, either, with one of the new reviews already on the site dealing with a recent offering that should never have been written.
Questions? Comments? Link inquiries? Books for reviews? Feel free to contact either the site or me directly.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Where I'm Hanging Out These Days
While I continue slowly pulling together pieces for the next several installments of my "Just Conjecturin'" series, the blog itself must go on. But of course I've been busy, playing not too much poker and that little bit not too well, and such stories aren't very interesting, hence the lack of wordage. I've been working on this and that and the next as well, also occupying my time, and some of that is now starting to appear publicly.
One new spot where you can find my irreverent postings these days is on the revamped Kick Ass Poker blog. Jason and Brad and the gang have been good e-friends over the years, and I'm happy to have a chance to once again contribute some content to what's always been an entertaining site. Visit the home page, surf around, and of course bookmark the blog. You'll find me sounding off on something there roughly four times each week, as I have been for the past six weeks.
The book-review project continues as well, and as soon as that site goes live, I'll drop a link here. We'll be starting that one off with reviews of ten of the best books poker has served up over the years, then moving on from there.
One new spot where you can find my irreverent postings these days is on the revamped Kick Ass Poker blog. Jason and Brad and the gang have been good e-friends over the years, and I'm happy to have a chance to once again contribute some content to what's always been an entertaining site. Visit the home page, surf around, and of course bookmark the blog. You'll find me sounding off on something there roughly four times each week, as I have been for the past six weeks.
The book-review project continues as well, and as soon as that site goes live, I'll drop a link here. We'll be starting that one off with reviews of ten of the best books poker has served up over the years, then moving on from there.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Checking in from Hammond
The WSOP Circuit stop at Hammond, Indiana (not far from Chicago) winds down this week with a $10,000 "high rollers" event today. I'm definitely not a high roller, though I did stop in on Friday and Sunday and play a bit. I hadn't seen a number of industry friends in over a year and I wanted to check in and say hi, and I did that, seeing TD's Nolan and Steve and Charlie and dealers such as Rich and Thomas, all long-time poker friends, plus Donnie Peters and FerricRamsium and others. I missed Kat Liebert and a few other players but did catch Alex Outhred playing in the same $350 Sunday event I took a stab at, so that was good, too.
My poker went iffy. I won my first $130 sat on Friday night so I picked up enough lammers to play the rest of the weekend, but I had no more success. First was the 7pm Friday night tourney, with a weird structure that lets you play for fun for the first hour but guarantees you'll be microstacked by 10:00. I did and I was, and I ran sevens into nines at that point. I went downstairs and bubbled another sat (drat!), then came back late Sunday morning to play the Event #8.
Sunday's tourney had 468 players, starting with 10,000 in chips each. I made the top 200 and lasted 11 or 12 levels but never had any cards. Up until the last hand, I had only one hand higher than 6-6, and that was an under-the-gun J-J with which I took down a no-action pot. In my last hand, I had Q-Q -- under the gun again -- and was called by the player behind me and reraised by the next player, a young player new to the table who had already repopped me off a different preflop hand when I tried to steal the blinds. He gave every indication of being LAGgy.
With only about 12,000 left at this point, and me already in for 2,000 (blinds 300/600/50), calling all-in was a no-brainer. I turned up my Q-Q and he turned up A-Kx, and the ace flopped.
At least I got to watch most of the Packers-Vikings game.
My poker went iffy. I won my first $130 sat on Friday night so I picked up enough lammers to play the rest of the weekend, but I had no more success. First was the 7pm Friday night tourney, with a weird structure that lets you play for fun for the first hour but guarantees you'll be microstacked by 10:00. I did and I was, and I ran sevens into nines at that point. I went downstairs and bubbled another sat (drat!), then came back late Sunday morning to play the Event #8.
Sunday's tourney had 468 players, starting with 10,000 in chips each. I made the top 200 and lasted 11 or 12 levels but never had any cards. Up until the last hand, I had only one hand higher than 6-6, and that was an under-the-gun J-J with which I took down a no-action pot. In my last hand, I had Q-Q -- under the gun again -- and was called by the player behind me and reraised by the next player, a young player new to the table who had already repopped me off a different preflop hand when I tried to steal the blinds. He gave every indication of being LAGgy.
With only about 12,000 left at this point, and me already in for 2,000 (blinds 300/600/50), calling all-in was a no-brainer. I turned up my Q-Q and he turned up A-Kx, and the ace flopped.
At least I got to watch most of the Packers-Vikings game.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Just Conjecturin', Volume 26: Who or What is Riviera, Ltd.?
Some new documents connected to the ongoing Excapsa/Cereus/AP legal maneuverings have popped up over on the wsbg.com liquidation site, and I'll return to the topic of Avione soon enough. Just note that business name for a bit; it's important. It is, however, just one important element in the net of shell companies surrounding all things Cereus. Today we'll post a bit on other matters, mostly because I already have this post largely written and I haven't published anything of note in a couple of weeks.
One of the difficulties I've encountered in researching various aspects of the scandals is deciding when to release certain pieces of information, balancing the information itself against the need or promise to protect many sources' identities. It's that which makes me agonize at times over releasing various items. I believe there will come a time when all can be told, but I also believe that patience in some matters is best, knowing that there are internal pressures afoot that continue to slowly force these entire stories into public view.
There are three dynamic groups presently battling over Cereus assets and control. Two of the three are aggrieved shareholder blocs -- one each on the Excapsa (UltimateBet) and Absolute Poker sides -- with the inner core group currently in control at AP euphemistically referred to as the "Toms and Tatums" (plus a few privileged others), which may now include a select few eWorld players who came along for the ride, post-acquisition. It seems clear that the power brokers at both companies left the rank-and-file shareholders grasping air back in late 2006, only to see the whole pyramid totter when the reverberations from the multiple cheating scandals came clear. The scandals combined with the UIGEA fallout left significantly less revenue to play with, leaving these various groups to fight for whatever was left.
I have many, many e-mails and anecdotes about certain people's involvement, but perhaps a bit of hard evidence is needed today as a change of pace. Both UB and AP were crafted in layered, obfuscating ways, and as indicated above, Cereus's structure today is another slathering of layers over the top of what previously existed, made even more obtuse by the recent paper sale to Antigua-based Blanca Games. The Blanca sale seems to have been put together in early July, a very rush-rush deal, perhaps precipated -- and this is my opinion only -- by Joe Norton no longer wanting to be tied to the Cereus stink. To think this is anything other than a shell sale designed to hide assets is folly. As one of my trusted friends wrote to me a few weeks back: "Re: stupid... Stuart Gordon is your knight in shining armor??"
Gordon has been alleged to me to be a friend of one of the AP frat boys, closely tied to the Costa Rica scene. 'Nuff said. (With apologies to Stan Lee, natch.)
Today, though, let's drift elsewhere. Before one can fully grasp the state of Cereus present, one needs to flesh out a better picture of Cereus past. The old bones are still there if you look in the right spots.
People may remember that when Nat, I and at least one other person honed in on the importance of the infamous "scott@rivieraltd.com" address in CrazyMarco's spreadsheet, the folks at AP seem to have gone into a panic to change things and cover them up. Mind you, this was late 2007 -- meaning the operational people who then set out to cover things up were the same people, by and large, who remain working at Cereus today.
I haven't gone back and pulled the chat logs and e-mails Nat Arem and I had, because by themselves they're of little importance. Without even looking at those, though, I can tell you that it was late the night of October 15, 2007 when the search got this breakthrough; I was on chat with him that night a couple of different times. I knew he had the greater tech capability and asked him to look closer at "rivieraltd.com," and Nat is the one who pinged the domain, did some other checking and found the direct link to the Mohawk server farm. Here's how Nat typed in his findings back then on 2+2:
10-15-2007, 11:32 PM #517
N 82 50 24
Pooh-Bah
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Las Vegas
Posts: 5,024
Re: lolz super accountz
Wow, I just found something else that I think is huge. This whole thing could run reallllly deep.
Okay, so, the email of the 2nd guy (ie, NOT user 363) is at the domain "rivieraltd.com" -- that is the domain registered with Domain Discreet.
I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier, but I pinged rivieraltd.com to get the IP at which it is hosted (going to the website doesn't show anything except the email login). The IP address is 66.212.244.147.
I then ran a traceroute on 66.212.244.147 to see where it is hosted. That IP address traces back to "po12.dr4.kdca.mohawk.ca" ... which is obviously connected to Kahnawake.
Simple explanation for those who don't understand:
The guy who was on the same IP as the user 363 had his email set to an email that is hosted by Kahnawake Gaming Commission.
But that's not at all the story. What happened was that the uncovering and recognition of the rivieraltd.com domain seems to have set off a frantic coverup of both the domain itself and the people behind it. "They're changing things!" is how I remember Nat relaying this, even as 2+2 participants discussed the findings and their significance in this thread. Among other things, the whois for the domain ownership record was immediately changed, locked and sealed in such a way that these days I think it'd take a court order or action by government investigators to uncover it in its original form. The internet records show that it had swung over to October 16, 2007 as these changes started to be made, time calculated by whatever or wherever location officially tracks such matters.
However, the act of covering stuff up leaves its own distinctive footprint, much the way that using bleach to destroy a bloodstain gets rid of the DNA but tends to leave big bleachy residue stains where none ought to appear. The people responsible changed stuff repeatedly over the next several days, as shown by the historical whois, which simply notes the dates changes are made and which is public record:
At least one change was made to the site each day on those shown above, all starting on October 16, when the corporate coverup shifted into panic mode. Note that the above screen only shows those days when changes were made; in all likelihood, multiple changes to the records were made on one or more of those days as well.
The rivieraltd.com domain, in case you're wondering, was created in February of 2007, and it was at the time of its public outing a gateway to a mail server. Rivieraltd.com, in addition to whatever role it had/has, seems to have been the mail hub of choice for AP executives, managers, owners, etc., and I'm in possession of several e-mails showing AP VIPs using rivieraltd.com addresses for corporate matters. I choose not to publish these at this time, for multiple reasons, but may in the near future.
Still, the rivieraltd.com domain remains interesting, and it is still associated with AP and Cereus today. Soon after the discovery of its connection to Absolute Poker, the domain information was changed and blocked. However, either the information has been changed again, or the company just got lazy about keeping the information hidden between some registrar's anonymous hosting service. Today a public view of rivieraltd.com is again visible, though surfing to the site itself shows nothing but air:
The listed registrant, Diana Hunt, is a confirmed AP shareholder. More importantly, she has multiple connections to the inner ownership group, being another U of Montana graduate, and she's spent time in Las Vegas, Portland and elsewhere. She has (or has had in the past) connections on social networking sites with other AP notables, and is reputed to be close friends with Tom Wenz, who is also an AP shareholder and currently believed to be #3 in Cereus's present chain of command.
One of the difficulties I've encountered in researching various aspects of the scandals is deciding when to release certain pieces of information, balancing the information itself against the need or promise to protect many sources' identities. It's that which makes me agonize at times over releasing various items. I believe there will come a time when all can be told, but I also believe that patience in some matters is best, knowing that there are internal pressures afoot that continue to slowly force these entire stories into public view.
There are three dynamic groups presently battling over Cereus assets and control. Two of the three are aggrieved shareholder blocs -- one each on the Excapsa (UltimateBet) and Absolute Poker sides -- with the inner core group currently in control at AP euphemistically referred to as the "Toms and Tatums" (plus a few privileged others), which may now include a select few eWorld players who came along for the ride, post-acquisition. It seems clear that the power brokers at both companies left the rank-and-file shareholders grasping air back in late 2006, only to see the whole pyramid totter when the reverberations from the multiple cheating scandals came clear. The scandals combined with the UIGEA fallout left significantly less revenue to play with, leaving these various groups to fight for whatever was left.
I have many, many e-mails and anecdotes about certain people's involvement, but perhaps a bit of hard evidence is needed today as a change of pace. Both UB and AP were crafted in layered, obfuscating ways, and as indicated above, Cereus's structure today is another slathering of layers over the top of what previously existed, made even more obtuse by the recent paper sale to Antigua-based Blanca Games. The Blanca sale seems to have been put together in early July, a very rush-rush deal, perhaps precipated -- and this is my opinion only -- by Joe Norton no longer wanting to be tied to the Cereus stink. To think this is anything other than a shell sale designed to hide assets is folly. As one of my trusted friends wrote to me a few weeks back: "Re: stupid... Stuart Gordon is your knight in shining armor??"
Gordon has been alleged to me to be a friend of one of the AP frat boys, closely tied to the Costa Rica scene. 'Nuff said. (With apologies to Stan Lee, natch.)
Today, though, let's drift elsewhere. Before one can fully grasp the state of Cereus present, one needs to flesh out a better picture of Cereus past. The old bones are still there if you look in the right spots.
People may remember that when Nat, I and at least one other person honed in on the importance of the infamous "scott@rivieraltd.com" address in CrazyMarco's spreadsheet, the folks at AP seem to have gone into a panic to change things and cover them up. Mind you, this was late 2007 -- meaning the operational people who then set out to cover things up were the same people, by and large, who remain working at Cereus today.
I haven't gone back and pulled the chat logs and e-mails Nat Arem and I had, because by themselves they're of little importance. Without even looking at those, though, I can tell you that it was late the night of October 15, 2007 when the search got this breakthrough; I was on chat with him that night a couple of different times. I knew he had the greater tech capability and asked him to look closer at "rivieraltd.com," and Nat is the one who pinged the domain, did some other checking and found the direct link to the Mohawk server farm. Here's how Nat typed in his findings back then on 2+2:
10-15-2007, 11:32 PM #517
N 82 50 24
Pooh-Bah
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Las Vegas
Posts: 5,024
Re: lolz super accountz
Wow, I just found something else that I think is huge. This whole thing could run reallllly deep.
Okay, so, the email of the 2nd guy (ie, NOT user 363) is at the domain "rivieraltd.com" -- that is the domain registered with Domain Discreet.
I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier, but I pinged rivieraltd.com to get the IP at which it is hosted (going to the website doesn't show anything except the email login). The IP address is 66.212.244.147.
I then ran a traceroute on 66.212.244.147 to see where it is hosted. That IP address traces back to "po12.dr4.kdca.mohawk.ca" ... which is obviously connected to Kahnawake.
Simple explanation for those who don't understand:
The guy who was on the same IP as the user 363 had his email set to an email that is hosted by Kahnawake Gaming Commission.
But that's not at all the story. What happened was that the uncovering and recognition of the rivieraltd.com domain seems to have set off a frantic coverup of both the domain itself and the people behind it. "They're changing things!" is how I remember Nat relaying this, even as 2+2 participants discussed the findings and their significance in this thread. Among other things, the whois for the domain ownership record was immediately changed, locked and sealed in such a way that these days I think it'd take a court order or action by government investigators to uncover it in its original form. The internet records show that it had swung over to October 16, 2007 as these changes started to be made, time calculated by whatever or wherever location officially tracks such matters.
However, the act of covering stuff up leaves its own distinctive footprint, much the way that using bleach to destroy a bloodstain gets rid of the DNA but tends to leave big bleachy residue stains where none ought to appear. The people responsible changed stuff repeatedly over the next several days, as shown by the historical whois, which simply notes the dates changes are made and which is public record:
At least one change was made to the site each day on those shown above, all starting on October 16, when the corporate coverup shifted into panic mode. Note that the above screen only shows those days when changes were made; in all likelihood, multiple changes to the records were made on one or more of those days as well.
The rivieraltd.com domain, in case you're wondering, was created in February of 2007, and it was at the time of its public outing a gateway to a mail server. Rivieraltd.com, in addition to whatever role it had/has, seems to have been the mail hub of choice for AP executives, managers, owners, etc., and I'm in possession of several e-mails showing AP VIPs using rivieraltd.com addresses for corporate matters. I choose not to publish these at this time, for multiple reasons, but may in the near future.
Still, the rivieraltd.com domain remains interesting, and it is still associated with AP and Cereus today. Soon after the discovery of its connection to Absolute Poker, the domain information was changed and blocked. However, either the information has been changed again, or the company just got lazy about keeping the information hidden between some registrar's anonymous hosting service. Today a public view of rivieraltd.com is again visible, though surfing to the site itself shows nothing but air:
The listed registrant, Diana Hunt, is a confirmed AP shareholder. More importantly, she has multiple connections to the inner ownership group, being another U of Montana graduate, and she's spent time in Las Vegas, Portland and elsewhere. She has (or has had in the past) connections on social networking sites with other AP notables, and is reputed to be close friends with Tom Wenz, who is also an AP shareholder and currently believed to be #3 in Cereus's present chain of command.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Now Doing Reviews -- Poker Books Wanted
A little bit of work comin' my way, it seems, as an under-renovation poker site wants yours truly to do an ongoing, extensive series of book reviews. Once the site is reworked and operational I'll post a link to it here. It's not for a whole lot of pay, but it least it gives me something new to write about.
While we're going to start out with many of the classic of poker literature and strategy -- such as they are -- I plan to review just about anything that comes my way. This includes books past and present, eBooks, and just about anything you could name, if all goes according to plan. Therefore, if you've got a book or books you'd like me to consider for review, please contact me for mailing instructions. (Random donations of old poker books will also be accepted.) I own perhaps 40 poker books already, which is not a largish library by any measure, but obviously those 40 I'd have no need to receive again.
While we're going to start out with many of the classic of poker literature and strategy -- such as they are -- I plan to review just about anything that comes my way. This includes books past and present, eBooks, and just about anything you could name, if all goes according to plan. Therefore, if you've got a book or books you'd like me to consider for review, please contact me for mailing instructions. (Random donations of old poker books will also be accepted.) I own perhaps 40 poker books already, which is not a largish library by any measure, but obviously those 40 I'd have no need to receive again.
Friday, September 03, 2010
Just Conjecturin', Volume 25: Flotsam, Jetsam and other Errata
While I'm waiting for a few hotter leads in the ongoing scandals to work themselves out, I've decided to go back and correct a few of the things I've gotten wrong in previous posts. From Post 1 of this entire series, when I didn't know nearly as much as I do today, I said I'd be willing to get things wrong and fix them later if that's what it took to force the full stories out.
That's why I named this the "Conjecturin'" series way back when. From yourdictionary.com:
Conjecture:
con·jec·ture (kən jek′c̸hər)
noun
1. an inferring, theorizing, or predicting from incomplete or uncertain evidence; guesswork: an editorial full of conjecture
2. an inference, theory, or prediction based on guesswork; guess
3. Obsolete occult divination
Definition #3 is cool, but a bit off track. Moving on....
It wasn't until after the first half dozen posts or so that new facts and evidence began to emerge, but by then it hardly paid to change the series' title. I even said this, back in that JC #1: "Note that I could be full of it on some of the details, but here's the start of my best guess as to how it all unfolded."
Way back in that JC #1, I theorized incorrectly that it was 2001 when UltimateBet came together. It was actually 1999, and the genesis of it may have been back in 1998. Though the date was wrong, my theories of how and why it came together seem to have been more or less on the mark, even if I now know those thoughts were very incomplete and described only a small part of the greater picture.
Probably the place where I went most off course was in JC #6, where I attempted a mathematical exploration of what happened to 2.6 million shares that were forfeited as part of the initial scandal developments at UB. It was clear that 4.3 of the 6.9 million shares that were forcibly seized belonged to Russ Hamilton, but the other 2.6 million's ownership was anybody's... conjecture. I attempted a complicated mathematical explanation that hinted that these shares might have been Fred David's, as David was a known key member of the operations staff and was indeed the person whose name was connected to the much-publicized "-fred-" internal transfer account, one of at least five such transfer accounts that existed. Those transfer accounts had no purpose for existing except to shuffle money around, sometimes legitimately, sometimes not.
But it now appears that Fred David was just the loyal soldier/company worker following orders from ownership, though of course time will tell all. The -fred- account may not even have been under his unilateral control. Moreover, his shares were not among those seized as part of the remainder of that initial 6.9 million cancellation, nor were his shares among those surrendered in the second round of share annulments, though those of three others were. I've held back from publicizing those three names because at least one of those was also innocent of the cheating, but was seemingly caught in some legal trickery. There have been some dirty lawyers afoot. Lots of them.
Also, the early JC posts that looked at hand histories were simply a false lead. The UB hand histories as released were nothing but a complicated attempt to obfuscate the real truth while attempting to justify the refunded amounts as being a whole and fair settlement. But it was always a shell game, and I wasted a couple of days back then trying to find examples of cheating that simply didn't, couldn't exist in what was provided. I won't delete those posts because I wrote them back then in good faith (and misguided effort), but except for exposing the bogus and chopped-up nature of the hand histories and how they were parceled out to players, the content within the hands themselves is pretty much worthless.
The reason why complete UB hand histories have never been released is very simple: Doing so would expose other accounts and different avenues of cheating and theft not already publicly acknowledged, even if in relatively smaller quantities than the $22 million or so accounted for in the one massive family of cheating accounts already partially exposed. There's more to it than that, but that's the bottom line.
That's enough for today, I think.
That's why I named this the "Conjecturin'" series way back when. From yourdictionary.com:
Conjecture:
con·jec·ture (kən jek′c̸hər)
noun
1. an inferring, theorizing, or predicting from incomplete or uncertain evidence; guesswork: an editorial full of conjecture
2. an inference, theory, or prediction based on guesswork; guess
3. Obsolete occult divination
Definition #3 is cool, but a bit off track. Moving on....
It wasn't until after the first half dozen posts or so that new facts and evidence began to emerge, but by then it hardly paid to change the series' title. I even said this, back in that JC #1: "Note that I could be full of it on some of the details, but here's the start of my best guess as to how it all unfolded."
Way back in that JC #1, I theorized incorrectly that it was 2001 when UltimateBet came together. It was actually 1999, and the genesis of it may have been back in 1998. Though the date was wrong, my theories of how and why it came together seem to have been more or less on the mark, even if I now know those thoughts were very incomplete and described only a small part of the greater picture.
Probably the place where I went most off course was in JC #6, where I attempted a mathematical exploration of what happened to 2.6 million shares that were forfeited as part of the initial scandal developments at UB. It was clear that 4.3 of the 6.9 million shares that were forcibly seized belonged to Russ Hamilton, but the other 2.6 million's ownership was anybody's... conjecture. I attempted a complicated mathematical explanation that hinted that these shares might have been Fred David's, as David was a known key member of the operations staff and was indeed the person whose name was connected to the much-publicized "-fred-" internal transfer account, one of at least five such transfer accounts that existed. Those transfer accounts had no purpose for existing except to shuffle money around, sometimes legitimately, sometimes not.
But it now appears that Fred David was just the loyal soldier/company worker following orders from ownership, though of course time will tell all. The -fred- account may not even have been under his unilateral control. Moreover, his shares were not among those seized as part of the remainder of that initial 6.9 million cancellation, nor were his shares among those surrendered in the second round of share annulments, though those of three others were. I've held back from publicizing those three names because at least one of those was also innocent of the cheating, but was seemingly caught in some legal trickery. There have been some dirty lawyers afoot. Lots of them.
Also, the early JC posts that looked at hand histories were simply a false lead. The UB hand histories as released were nothing but a complicated attempt to obfuscate the real truth while attempting to justify the refunded amounts as being a whole and fair settlement. But it was always a shell game, and I wasted a couple of days back then trying to find examples of cheating that simply didn't, couldn't exist in what was provided. I won't delete those posts because I wrote them back then in good faith (and misguided effort), but except for exposing the bogus and chopped-up nature of the hand histories and how they were parceled out to players, the content within the hands themselves is pretty much worthless.
The reason why complete UB hand histories have never been released is very simple: Doing so would expose other accounts and different avenues of cheating and theft not already publicly acknowledged, even if in relatively smaller quantities than the $22 million or so accounted for in the one massive family of cheating accounts already partially exposed. There's more to it than that, but that's the bottom line.
That's enough for today, I think.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Year of the Doomswitch Continues
As in life, so at the poker table. I fired up three SNGs to see if my 2010 malaise has abated. What a fucking joke of an idea that was.
First one, I made an isolation preflop re-raise with QQ and encountered a donkey jam by the BB, someone I already had notes on. This was an easy call, even though he turned up the expected AK. K on flop, IGHN. Checking back through recent tourney histories shows me at 3-for-19 the last six weeks when I've gotten the chips in with QQ against AK lately. Run-goot lolaments.
Second one, I get my chips in with AT against KT. Flop 89J, turn Q. IGHN.
Third one, I double up early after getting rid of some limpers with a raise to 300 (25/50) with TT. I get one caller. Flop 678. I bet, he jams, I call. He shows T7. What sort of idiot puts a fifth of his stack at risk preflop with ten-seven??? But whatever. Despite the odds of the nine coming for the chop being about 50:50, I somehow double up. I pick up another thousand when my QQ miraculously holds against 44, all in preflop.
But then, down to four players, I make the mistake of taking KK up against AJ. A on flop, of course. Next hand I have AT, moving in on a player who has me just outchipped but I think he's stealing light (and he indeed shows A7), and Mister AJ calls both me and another player... with K8. Flop KJ8. IGHN.
Enough, I tell ya. Just enough.
First one, I made an isolation preflop re-raise with QQ and encountered a donkey jam by the BB, someone I already had notes on. This was an easy call, even though he turned up the expected AK. K on flop, IGHN. Checking back through recent tourney histories shows me at 3-for-19 the last six weeks when I've gotten the chips in with QQ against AK lately. Run-goot lolaments.
Second one, I get my chips in with AT against KT. Flop 89J, turn Q. IGHN.
Third one, I double up early after getting rid of some limpers with a raise to 300 (25/50) with TT. I get one caller. Flop 678. I bet, he jams, I call. He shows T7. What sort of idiot puts a fifth of his stack at risk preflop with ten-seven??? But whatever. Despite the odds of the nine coming for the chop being about 50:50, I somehow double up. I pick up another thousand when my QQ miraculously holds against 44, all in preflop.
But then, down to four players, I make the mistake of taking KK up against AJ. A on flop, of course. Next hand I have AT, moving in on a player who has me just outchipped but I think he's stealing light (and he indeed shows A7), and Mister AJ calls both me and another player... with K8. Flop KJ8. IGHN.
Enough, I tell ya. Just enough.
Sunday, August 08, 2010
Just Conjecturin', Volume 24: Tying Together Some Leads
I added in the following thoughts in a 2+2 thread on these matters, and wanted to toss in a little bit more here:
Honestly, I don't know quite how to add up each and all of the pieces myself; I think I have it and then I rethink it again. Unless something hinky was going on, it just does not make sense. The original nacion.com story about the crash included what appeared to be a nod and a wink about the passengers stating that they were flying to the Caribbean when the flight's registered destination was Cartagena. A Sabreliner's cruising range is 2500 miles, and it can get anywhere in the Caribbean with ease from Costa Rica. So -refueling- at Cartagena is out as a possibility, which is what I think the nacion.com piece was winking at.
Look at this from both sides and you'll see the problem. Side A is that the money rumors had some truth to them. The persistent rumors involve money skimming and laundering, and if that were true, then a flight to somewhere like Antigua makes sense, because that's a little bit of a nexus (as is Netherlands Antilles) for some shady corporate banking practices. Panama has some of that, too.
Please keep in mind also for this that the amounts of money rumored -- if in American bills, the world's smuggling currency of choice -- would have filled up at least one duffel bag and maybe more if bills smaller than $100s were used. Such smuggling usually involves secretion inside the fuselage or similar subterfuge.
Now, if I were carrying a large quantity of cash and were moving it elsewhere, I'd be making an unnecessary stop in Columbia about when hell freezes over. So this line of reasoning ends in a big question mark, because there's clearly something false or wrong or missing or whatever among all these published tales.
Side B is that the rumors of large amounts of cash are wrong, and that the flight was indeed a wholly innocent, vacation-only trip. If that's true, and there was nothing wrong with the plane or no evidence of it being doctored in some way for use in smuggling, then why did the company owning it choose to abandon it after waiting two and a half years? That line of reasoning doesn't pan out either. The engines and electronics were barely or not damaged at all and were easily salvageable.
But all this really misses the point of the posts. No one has ever come up with a reason why the PotRipper cheating on September 12 was done so recklessly and with such wild abandon. All the stuff I've laid out, the timelines and stories and such in #22 and #23, point to at least one plausible theory: The person or people behind the PotRipper account needed money in a hurry to clean up a mess. That it turned into a bigger mess and brought down a cheating operation is just an indicator of how reckless it was.
* * * * *
One of the points raised in comments is very valid -- as noted in the first comment (and so far only) comment on the previous post, there may have been other legitimate reasons for the subsequent abandonment of the plane. The counterpoint to that is that there were a whole of strange happenings going on all at once, and when too many coincidences pile up, it's time to keep digging.
First, the PotRipper tourney was the first cheating done after the cheating accounts' operator(s) returned from St. Lucia/Antigua. It was also tournament cheating, as opposed to cash-game cheating; lower initial investment for a proportionately higher payout. It doesn't mean that other tournament cheating wasn't done at some previous point, but it does support the hypothesis that there was an urgent need for money, and let's not forget things like these withdrawals (and cancelled withdrawals) for the house-run Graycat account:
Notice all the cancelled withdrawals on September 8th, 2007, which happened while the cheaters were off in the Caribbean somewhere. The cheater(s) returned on September 12 and immediately cheated on a relatively new account, PotRipper. Four days later, on September 16th, there's a verified withdrawal of $150,000 from Graycat, just before the presumed remaining $30,000+ is seized and the account shut down.
The plane crash may or not have a direct bearing on some of these other things, but the "needed some money in a hurry" theory as it relates to the desperate method of cheating exhibited in the PotRipper tourney is not a concept that can be dismissed with a wave of a hand.
* * *
This image is unrelated -- I just can't connect to my free image-hosting site this morning, and need a spot to upload a miscellaneous doo-dad. Please ignore:
Honestly, I don't know quite how to add up each and all of the pieces myself; I think I have it and then I rethink it again. Unless something hinky was going on, it just does not make sense. The original nacion.com story about the crash included what appeared to be a nod and a wink about the passengers stating that they were flying to the Caribbean when the flight's registered destination was Cartagena. A Sabreliner's cruising range is 2500 miles, and it can get anywhere in the Caribbean with ease from Costa Rica. So -refueling- at Cartagena is out as a possibility, which is what I think the nacion.com piece was winking at.
Look at this from both sides and you'll see the problem. Side A is that the money rumors had some truth to them. The persistent rumors involve money skimming and laundering, and if that were true, then a flight to somewhere like Antigua makes sense, because that's a little bit of a nexus (as is Netherlands Antilles) for some shady corporate banking practices. Panama has some of that, too.
Please keep in mind also for this that the amounts of money rumored -- if in American bills, the world's smuggling currency of choice -- would have filled up at least one duffel bag and maybe more if bills smaller than $100s were used. Such smuggling usually involves secretion inside the fuselage or similar subterfuge.
Now, if I were carrying a large quantity of cash and were moving it elsewhere, I'd be making an unnecessary stop in Columbia about when hell freezes over. So this line of reasoning ends in a big question mark, because there's clearly something false or wrong or missing or whatever among all these published tales.
Side B is that the rumors of large amounts of cash are wrong, and that the flight was indeed a wholly innocent, vacation-only trip. If that's true, and there was nothing wrong with the plane or no evidence of it being doctored in some way for use in smuggling, then why did the company owning it choose to abandon it after waiting two and a half years? That line of reasoning doesn't pan out either. The engines and electronics were barely or not damaged at all and were easily salvageable.
But all this really misses the point of the posts. No one has ever come up with a reason why the PotRipper cheating on September 12 was done so recklessly and with such wild abandon. All the stuff I've laid out, the timelines and stories and such in #22 and #23, point to at least one plausible theory: The person or people behind the PotRipper account needed money in a hurry to clean up a mess. That it turned into a bigger mess and brought down a cheating operation is just an indicator of how reckless it was.
* * * * *
One of the points raised in comments is very valid -- as noted in the first comment (and so far only) comment on the previous post, there may have been other legitimate reasons for the subsequent abandonment of the plane. The counterpoint to that is that there were a whole of strange happenings going on all at once, and when too many coincidences pile up, it's time to keep digging.
First, the PotRipper tourney was the first cheating done after the cheating accounts' operator(s) returned from St. Lucia/Antigua. It was also tournament cheating, as opposed to cash-game cheating; lower initial investment for a proportionately higher payout. It doesn't mean that other tournament cheating wasn't done at some previous point, but it does support the hypothesis that there was an urgent need for money, and let's not forget things like these withdrawals (and cancelled withdrawals) for the house-run Graycat account:
Notice all the cancelled withdrawals on September 8th, 2007, which happened while the cheaters were off in the Caribbean somewhere. The cheater(s) returned on September 12 and immediately cheated on a relatively new account, PotRipper. Four days later, on September 16th, there's a verified withdrawal of $150,000 from Graycat, just before the presumed remaining $30,000+ is seized and the account shut down.
The plane crash may or not have a direct bearing on some of these other things, but the "needed some money in a hurry" theory as it relates to the desperate method of cheating exhibited in the PotRipper tourney is not a concept that can be dismissed with a wave of a hand.
* * *
This image is unrelated -- I just can't connect to my free image-hosting site this morning, and need a spot to upload a miscellaneous doo-dad. Please ignore:
Friday, August 06, 2010
Just Conjecturin', Volume 23: So What Happened to the Plane?
Last post, I reprised the history of the non-fatal 2007 plane crash of the rented jet carrying AP executives Scott Tom and Hilt Tatum and their spouses, showing how the crash and a possible resumption of the intended vacation by the two executive couples corresponding with a brief gap and subsequent Caribbean island-hopping jaunt by one or more of the people behind the AP insider cheating scandal, showing that the dates offered some interesting circumstantial connections.
Not included in that post was the fact that the crashed Sabreliner was flown over to Costa Rica from Panama, picking up at least one passenger in San Juan (if not all of them), and its subsequent destination from Costa Rica as reported here was Cartegena, Columbia, not St. Lucia or Antigua.
Those same forums and stories I linked to in the previous post included many wild rumors and allegations, including one that someone on the crashed plane was carrying $2-3 million in cash, hence rampant speculation about the planned Cartegena flight.
That stuff is rumor. The following is far more factual: The Panamanian company that rented the plane, Jet Lease Corp., Inc., decided to abandon the lightly crashed plane at the Juan Santamaria airport in Costa Rica, despite significant salvage value estimated at $350,000 of the plane's original $1 million worth. It's more curious because parts from the plane are now showing up on the Latin American black market for airplane parts, as detailed in this piece.
Why would any company abandon a third of a million dollars in plane parts that can easily be sold, as has now started to happen?
Not included in that post was the fact that the crashed Sabreliner was flown over to Costa Rica from Panama, picking up at least one passenger in San Juan (if not all of them), and its subsequent destination from Costa Rica as reported here was Cartegena, Columbia, not St. Lucia or Antigua.
Those same forums and stories I linked to in the previous post included many wild rumors and allegations, including one that someone on the crashed plane was carrying $2-3 million in cash, hence rampant speculation about the planned Cartegena flight.
That stuff is rumor. The following is far more factual: The Panamanian company that rented the plane, Jet Lease Corp., Inc., decided to abandon the lightly crashed plane at the Juan Santamaria airport in Costa Rica, despite significant salvage value estimated at $350,000 of the plane's original $1 million worth. It's more curious because parts from the plane are now showing up on the Latin American black market for airplane parts, as detailed in this piece.
Why would any company abandon a third of a million dollars in plane parts that can easily be sold, as has now started to happen?
Just Conjecturin', Volume 22: It's the Plane, Boss, the Plane!
With a tip of the hat to the late, great Herve Villechaize...
... as well as one to 2+2 poster TookURCookie, for reminding me about the plane crash involving Absolute Poker executives back in 2007. It occurred at 12:50pm on September 3, 2007, at the Juan Santamaria International airport in Alajuela, Costa Rica, just north of Costa Rica, wherein a rented private jet blew a tire just prior to takeoff and left the runway, skidding to a stop. No one was injured in the incident, but in leaving the runway the jet's landing gear collapsed and its fuel tank ruptured, closing the airfield for about six hours. There are some nice photos of the plane, the accident and its aftermath here.
Some of the earlier reports said that in addition to the pilot and co-pilot, two passengers were aboard. Other reports said there were four passengers, and those reports were correct: The passengers were AP executives Scott Tom and Oscar Hilt Tatum IV (two of the four Montana frat brothers who founded the firm), and their wives. Hilt's wife was five months pregnant at the time so she was transported to the hospital for a brief examination, but was quickly released.
(By the way, if anyone starts posting wedding photos on 2+2 again after reading this, I hope the mods permaban them.)
What the crash did was start off a whole series of lurid posts and stories, including some of the wildest allegations levied in all of the AP affair's aftermath -- up to $7 million in stolen funds from the AP site, Tom and/or Tatum having $2-3 million in cash on the crashed plane, allegations of cocaine use, and of course the reputed "American Beauty"-style portrait of reputed scandal kingpin and AP operational exec AJ Green (Allan J. Grimard) lying naked on a futon, mostly covered in $100 bills. That's just the start of it.
Looking back, did or do any of these tales have legs? That is, besides the reputed legs of AJ on the futon? In a future post we'll look at some of that stuff, and at least try to separate the pure rumor from what is known or can be discerned from mainstream media reports.
For now, though, it's about the crash itself, and its timing in relation to other events.
A couple of days ago, an anonymous poster on 2+2 using the handle CantStayQuietAnymo posted some usage logs and timestamps, as mentioned in my previous post. I did not have the DoubleDrag usage info, so let's put that in here, with another hat tip, and follow it by once again showing the user info for Graycat and PotChopper:
DOUBLEDRAG: Registered with IP 200.91.72.29
Shared computer with account names: PAYUP, SOX, GRAYCAT,
STEAMROLLER, POTRIPPER, BIGGTIME, DB9007
Only used one Computer, Device ID 11451887
IP's Used
9/6/2007 206.48.58.10 Location: ST. LUCIA
9/6/2007 thru 9/9/2007 204.188.174.201 Location: ANTIGUA
9/10/2007 209.59.103.108 Location: ANTIGUA
9/11/2007 206.48.58.10 Location: ST. LUCIA
9/13/2007 200.122.181.104 Location: COSTA RICA
9/16/2007 200.122.181.104 Location: COSTA RICA
And the two usage logs for Graycat and the one for PotRipper (click to enlarge).
Graycat:
PotRipper:
PotRipper, for all its infamy, was a brief-lived and seldom-used account. It was Graycat that by all indications was the chief inside cheating account, and look at its usage history, where it was logged into on September 2, 2007, not at all on September 3 or 4, briefly on September 5. We can see DoubleDrag present in St. Lucia on September 6, and then that account corresponds with Greycat, which turned up in Antigua on September 8 and St. Lucia on September 11 before returning to Costa Rica on the afternoon of September 12, where Doubledrag also shows up the following day. Wednesday, September 12, 2007, for those of you paying attention, was also the day of the infamous PotRipper/CrazyMarco tourney that eventually exposed all the cheating.
Back to the plane crash, and an original quote from a Teletica news report:
"Los ocupantes del avión eran el piloto Mario Quesada y el copiloto David Vos, además de 4 pasajeros: 2 parejas que iban de paseo hacia el Caribe." Yahoo's BabelFish translation is wretched, but what it's saying in addition to listing the pilot and co-pilot is that the passengers were off to start a Caribbean vacation, which it reiterated a few paragraphs later on.
If one surmises that after a day or two of dealing with the airplane mishap and its aftermath, then perhaps the Toms and Tatums -- continuing under the presumption that either Scott or Hilt or both were involved in the cheating -- went ahead and rebooked a flight and tried to enjoy the rest of a Caribbean-hopping vacation.
See, if any of the accounts Graycat or PotRipper or Doubledrag were in active use at about 2:50 pm on September 3rd, it would go a long way toward exonerating Scott Tom and/or Hilt Tatum IV. Such is not the case. Even though the evidence is circumstantial, it points in the opposite direction and keeps the fingers of blame pointed squarely in the same direction, at Scott Tom and those immediately surrounding him at the top of the AP operational heirarchy.
CantStayQuietAnymo added this in his recent post:
"Now what does all this mean? Were 2 fratboys hopping islands superusing the (sh)it out of customers. Or was their only one person traveling alone using two computers to commit the crime. The latter is my guess."
He'd guess the latter? I wouldn't. The cumulative timestamps indicate that it might very well indeed have been two fratboys island-hopping and superusing the shit out of customers, with or without AJ Green's contributions, at least in the days immediately prior to the Potripper affair.
More on the plane crash later.
... as well as one to 2+2 poster TookURCookie, for reminding me about the plane crash involving Absolute Poker executives back in 2007. It occurred at 12:50pm on September 3, 2007, at the Juan Santamaria International airport in Alajuela, Costa Rica, just north of Costa Rica, wherein a rented private jet blew a tire just prior to takeoff and left the runway, skidding to a stop. No one was injured in the incident, but in leaving the runway the jet's landing gear collapsed and its fuel tank ruptured, closing the airfield for about six hours. There are some nice photos of the plane, the accident and its aftermath here.
Some of the earlier reports said that in addition to the pilot and co-pilot, two passengers were aboard. Other reports said there were four passengers, and those reports were correct: The passengers were AP executives Scott Tom and Oscar Hilt Tatum IV (two of the four Montana frat brothers who founded the firm), and their wives. Hilt's wife was five months pregnant at the time so she was transported to the hospital for a brief examination, but was quickly released.
(By the way, if anyone starts posting wedding photos on 2+2 again after reading this, I hope the mods permaban them.)
What the crash did was start off a whole series of lurid posts and stories, including some of the wildest allegations levied in all of the AP affair's aftermath -- up to $7 million in stolen funds from the AP site, Tom and/or Tatum having $2-3 million in cash on the crashed plane, allegations of cocaine use, and of course the reputed "American Beauty"-style portrait of reputed scandal kingpin and AP operational exec AJ Green (Allan J. Grimard) lying naked on a futon, mostly covered in $100 bills. That's just the start of it.
Looking back, did or do any of these tales have legs? That is, besides the reputed legs of AJ on the futon? In a future post we'll look at some of that stuff, and at least try to separate the pure rumor from what is known or can be discerned from mainstream media reports.
For now, though, it's about the crash itself, and its timing in relation to other events.
A couple of days ago, an anonymous poster on 2+2 using the handle CantStayQuietAnymo posted some usage logs and timestamps, as mentioned in my previous post. I did not have the DoubleDrag usage info, so let's put that in here, with another hat tip, and follow it by once again showing the user info for Graycat and PotChopper:
DOUBLEDRAG: Registered with IP 200.91.72.29
Shared computer with account names: PAYUP, SOX, GRAYCAT,
STEAMROLLER, POTRIPPER, BIGGTIME, DB9007
Only used one Computer, Device ID 11451887
IP's Used
9/6/2007 206.48.58.10 Location: ST. LUCIA
9/6/2007 thru 9/9/2007 204.188.174.201 Location: ANTIGUA
9/10/2007 209.59.103.108 Location: ANTIGUA
9/11/2007 206.48.58.10 Location: ST. LUCIA
9/13/2007 200.122.181.104 Location: COSTA RICA
9/16/2007 200.122.181.104 Location: COSTA RICA
And the two usage logs for Graycat and the one for PotRipper (click to enlarge).
Graycat:
PotRipper:
PotRipper, for all its infamy, was a brief-lived and seldom-used account. It was Graycat that by all indications was the chief inside cheating account, and look at its usage history, where it was logged into on September 2, 2007, not at all on September 3 or 4, briefly on September 5. We can see DoubleDrag present in St. Lucia on September 6, and then that account corresponds with Greycat, which turned up in Antigua on September 8 and St. Lucia on September 11 before returning to Costa Rica on the afternoon of September 12, where Doubledrag also shows up the following day. Wednesday, September 12, 2007, for those of you paying attention, was also the day of the infamous PotRipper/CrazyMarco tourney that eventually exposed all the cheating.
Back to the plane crash, and an original quote from a Teletica news report:
"Los ocupantes del avión eran el piloto Mario Quesada y el copiloto David Vos, además de 4 pasajeros: 2 parejas que iban de paseo hacia el Caribe." Yahoo's BabelFish translation is wretched, but what it's saying in addition to listing the pilot and co-pilot is that the passengers were off to start a Caribbean vacation, which it reiterated a few paragraphs later on.
If one surmises that after a day or two of dealing with the airplane mishap and its aftermath, then perhaps the Toms and Tatums -- continuing under the presumption that either Scott or Hilt or both were involved in the cheating -- went ahead and rebooked a flight and tried to enjoy the rest of a Caribbean-hopping vacation.
See, if any of the accounts Graycat or PotRipper or Doubledrag were in active use at about 2:50 pm on September 3rd, it would go a long way toward exonerating Scott Tom and/or Hilt Tatum IV. Such is not the case. Even though the evidence is circumstantial, it points in the opposite direction and keeps the fingers of blame pointed squarely in the same direction, at Scott Tom and those immediately surrounding him at the top of the AP operational heirarchy.
CantStayQuietAnymo added this in his recent post:
"Now what does all this mean? Were 2 fratboys hopping islands superusing the (sh)it out of customers. Or was their only one person traveling alone using two computers to commit the crime. The latter is my guess."
He'd guess the latter? I wouldn't. The cumulative timestamps indicate that it might very well indeed have been two fratboys island-hopping and superusing the shit out of customers, with or without AJ Green's contributions, at least in the days immediately prior to the Potripper affair.
More on the plane crash later.
Tuesday, August 03, 2010
Just Conjecturin', Volume 21: Graycat the Traveler
Every once in a while the news peppers us with one of those feel-good stories about a cat that goes off on unintended journey of thousands of miles, hitching a ride in an airplane's cargo hold or climbing up inside a nice, warm engine compartment of an auto, only to wake up and start mewling a couple of time zones away.
Famed Absolute Poker house cheating account Greycat did that, too, seemingly, as did PotRipper. Since they'd resurfaced in different form in a recent thread on 2+2, I wanted to return to some of the information I first published regarding Graycat, Potripper, Doubledrag and the other cheating accounts, as published back in Conjecturin' 11 and 15. These images verify what's recently been published there.
Again, here's part of how Graycat traveled throughout Latin America and the Caribbean during the main cheating period. Clicking on them shows the larger version:
And here's similar for PotRipper:
Now, I can't yet find the related posts, but when the story first broke and AP peddled their original cover-up press releases, one of the tales being floated about supposed mastermind AJ Green (Alan Grimard) was that he was house-sitting at Scott Tom's Costa Rica house, thereby also attempting to explain away how the key IP residence was traced to Tom's residential address. If someone can point me to those posts or has reason to correct my memory, please contact me and I'll be happy to add it in here.
As with AP's claim about no cheating funds ever leaving the site, the evidence suggests the contrary about the whole "house sitting" tale. The reports I've heard are that AJ was one of the high-level office/operations managers, not the one doing all the traveling (even if he did some), though if an Interpol-type investigation ever dug into those Castries, St. Lucia resort registrations for the period in question, we'd know for sure, not that that's likely to happen. There aren't a lot of hotels and such there, just three or four, the largest of which seems to be the Sandals Regency complex.
About AJ Green: While it seems as though several top-level AP people were involved with participating and/or covering up the AP cheating shenanigans, AJ stands out because he's not a shareholder, to the best of my knowledge. That made him the logical choice to take the public heat, since when the fire's big enough, someone always has to get burned. There's a reasonable chance that he was paid a good chunk for doing so and was shuffled off to a parallel position with another AP division or connected company, perhaps also alleviating some of the antagonism between AJ and Costa Rican office statements that also surfaced at the time. Statements that I have received support the possibility that AJ, as with Scott Tom, remains firmly ensconced within the AP/Cereus family and related operations.
Graycat, as previously shown in this post, was an AP house account. It was originally Phil Tom's account, though Scott Tom has been reported to have used it at length as well. Phil had (perhaps still has) two cats, a gray one and a black one. They were named Graycat and Blackcat, respectively. Queue up the mouse jokes, everyone.
Famed Absolute Poker house cheating account Greycat did that, too, seemingly, as did PotRipper. Since they'd resurfaced in different form in a recent thread on 2+2, I wanted to return to some of the information I first published regarding Graycat, Potripper, Doubledrag and the other cheating accounts, as published back in Conjecturin' 11 and 15. These images verify what's recently been published there.
Again, here's part of how Graycat traveled throughout Latin America and the Caribbean during the main cheating period. Clicking on them shows the larger version:
And here's similar for PotRipper:
Now, I can't yet find the related posts, but when the story first broke and AP peddled their original cover-up press releases, one of the tales being floated about supposed mastermind AJ Green (Alan Grimard) was that he was house-sitting at Scott Tom's Costa Rica house, thereby also attempting to explain away how the key IP residence was traced to Tom's residential address. If someone can point me to those posts or has reason to correct my memory, please contact me and I'll be happy to add it in here.
As with AP's claim about no cheating funds ever leaving the site, the evidence suggests the contrary about the whole "house sitting" tale. The reports I've heard are that AJ was one of the high-level office/operations managers, not the one doing all the traveling (even if he did some), though if an Interpol-type investigation ever dug into those Castries, St. Lucia resort registrations for the period in question, we'd know for sure, not that that's likely to happen. There aren't a lot of hotels and such there, just three or four, the largest of which seems to be the Sandals Regency complex.
About AJ Green: While it seems as though several top-level AP people were involved with participating and/or covering up the AP cheating shenanigans, AJ stands out because he's not a shareholder, to the best of my knowledge. That made him the logical choice to take the public heat, since when the fire's big enough, someone always has to get burned. There's a reasonable chance that he was paid a good chunk for doing so and was shuffled off to a parallel position with another AP division or connected company, perhaps also alleviating some of the antagonism between AJ and Costa Rican office statements that also surfaced at the time. Statements that I have received support the possibility that AJ, as with Scott Tom, remains firmly ensconced within the AP/Cereus family and related operations.
Graycat, as previously shown in this post, was an AP house account. It was originally Phil Tom's account, though Scott Tom has been reported to have used it at length as well. Phil had (perhaps still has) two cats, a gray one and a black one. They were named Graycat and Blackcat, respectively. Queue up the mouse jokes, everyone.
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