The 2+2 Forum Archives: Cheating at AP, updated cliff notes

Here's what a lot of you have been waiting for... I got that phone call from AP.

But before I go into that, I need to post an important retraction to something I said earlier. I mentioned at one point that 1994 WSOP Champion Russ Hamilton owns Absolute Poker, and was responsible for the AP/UB purchase last year. THIS IS FALSE. I was unfortunatley given bad information about Russ by a source that is usually reliable. I apologize to Mr. Hamilton and to anyone who was misled by that statement. In fact, I would appreciate if the mods could remove that short post of mine (in the previous AP cheating thread), as I now believe it to be untrue.

Now, onto the AP phone call....

Yesterday, I spoke to AP and told them I wasn't going to be playing there until this matter was resolved to my satisfaction. Given that I have been one of their most active players over the past 2 years, they became concerned about my departure, and promised me a phone call from one of their managers.

Indeed, I received a phone call from Roger, who I have spoken to before concerning other matters in the past. At first, he attempted to deny that a superuser exists. I stopped him and told him everything I knew -- basically a rehash of all that has been posted here over the past month. He acknowledged hearing this information before, and said he has been following all of the 2+2 threads about the situation. I then went on to tell him the following...

There is too much evidence out there at this point for AP to be able to deny that this occurred. AP's continuing to make statments like the two we've seen serve only to make people angry and frustrated. Nobody here is interested in reading carefully-prepared corporate statements about how nothing nefarious occurred. There are a lot of really smart people on 2+2, and none of us will buy it in the face of everything else we know. What we have all been looking for are truthful and plausible answers to all of our questions.

I asked Roger to answer the following questions for me:

1) How do they explain the "perfect" play of POTRIPPER and the other accused cheaters, if there is no superuser involved?

2) What is the story with account 363?

3) What were the IP addresses of GRAYCAT, STEAMROLLER, DOUBLEDRAG, and POTRIPPER? Did they match their listed geographic locations? Were any in Costa Rica?

4) Where were SUPERCARDM55 and REYMNALDO (chip dump recipients) located? Did they cash out? Are they from Costa Rica?

5) What is the relationship between the 4 suspected cheaters and those accounts they dumped to?

6) Have you spoken on the phone to GRAYCAT, STEAMROLLER, POTRIPPER, and DOUBLEDRAG? What did they say? How did they explain the chip dumping? Did they admit to playing on those accounts?

Roger took notes on all of my questions. He promised to get answers for me later today.

Then he asked one question that sounded promising -- the first thing I've heard from an AP employee that gives me hope. He asked me if the players would be satisfied if we were to simply be returned the money that we lost to GRAYCAT, STEAMROLLER, POTRIPPER, and DOUBLEDRAG. Keeping in mind that I was probably speaking for a lot of the people involved, I answered the following:

Our biggest problem is the fact that we were cheated out of a lot of money -- about $700,000 in preliminary estimates. Our other big problem is the fact that we are being stonewalled about the situation and are not being dealt with honestly. It's frustrating to know that the high-limit AP community was cheated out of nearly a million dollars. It's arugably more frustrating for Absolute to deny that it happened, especially given all that has come out. If everyone affected could be compensated, it would be a HUGE step in the right direction, as it would make it clear to everyone that AP is interested in making the situation right.

I told Roger that I understood AP's situation. I said that I realized that they're "damned if they do, damned if they don't", regarding owning up to the superuser situation. If they admit their games were compromised by an insider with access to hole cards, it will be a huge story and nobody will trust their games again. If they stick to their bogus claim that no cheating occurred, everyone will be angry and feel cheated, as the existing mountain of evidence clearly says otherwise.

Roger was quick to agree with me, and in fact acted as if I hit upon something that he has been dealing with for a long time.

"Exactly. We can't win either way," he said.

I told him that I knew of a way that everyone could come out relatively happy.

There's no doubt that chip-dumping occurred on a massive scale. Chip-dumping is very much against AP rules, and obviously anyone engaging in it in such huge amounts is up to something no-good. It's not like it was a case of me dumping to another known player as a means to trade chips between sites. These were completely unknown accounts dumping to one another, and never being seen again. Surely AP could not be blamed for confiscating the money belonging to these chip-dumpers. Therefore, if the money from these accounts could be returned to those they won it from, on the basis that the accounts were closed for chip dumping, this would be a way that AP could legitimately return the money to the victims without admitting that a superuser account exists. Basically, they'd just be confiscating money from shady accounts (based upon the chip-dumping) and returning it to where it originally came from (instead of just keeping it on AP). Nobody has to admit to a superuser. Nobody has to admit that cheating went down. The affected parties will have their money back. There's no ideal solution to this mess, but I feel that this is probably the closest we can get to it.

Roger told me that my suggestion sounded reasonable, and that he would discuss it with other managers and the site owners. He promised to get back to me about everything by 3:00pm PDT.

Before I ended the phone call, I reminded Roger that we're all sick of rhetoric and carefully-worded corporate statements. Nobody is going to be satisfied until this is actually taken care of, and flat denials that anything unjust occurred does not equate to taking care of it. I told him again that a return of the stolen money would be generally seen as a VERY positive step on AP's part.

Let's face it, guys. While it would be wonderful for Absolute to fully own up to everything that has been found here, it would be suicide for the company. If they were to admit to the abuse of a superuser account -- especially by a former/current employee -- it would likely be picked up by the media everywhere. Major poker magazines would be all over it, blogs and internet news agencies (maybe even Drudge) would be all over it, and it might even make it onto the mainstream television and print news. AP has their own future to think about. They can't and won't destroy their own business just to satisfy those who were harmed by this. While it would be great for us to see AP announce, "Yes, there was a superuser. Yes, everyone was right all along. Yes, it was an inside job. Yes, we are giving everyone their money back", this is not something we can realistically expect, given the fallout that would occur.

The lightning struck once with AP. It won't strike again. If there was a superuser, you can bet there isn't one anymore. If certain employees or ex-employees had the idea that they could cheat and get away with it, they now know better. Quite honestly, I doubt this sort of thing will ever happen again at Absolute Poker. They've been put through such hell over this, and I'm sure they will be careful not to let this repeat.

At the same time, there's the issue about what already happened. They can't just sweep this under the rug and expect everyone to dismiss the fact that ~$700,000 was stolen from the high-limit community there. The money has to be returned. If it isn't, we can never forgive AP. If we get every stolen dollar back, I vote we give them another chance.

I will report again when I receive the phone call this afternoon.

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