CAP Partners Trading Cheat Jabs!

The fallout continues in the split between partners at Casino Affiliate Programs (better known as CAP). Co-founder, Lou Fabiano, has gone on the defensive and began posting on several message boards Monday accusing partner, Warren Jolly, withholding of funds. He also alleges that Jolly was the man behind a "rogue" online poker room, CardSpike.com. Both men have denied any role in CardSpike's ownership up until this point.

Fabiano commented Monday night:

"There are indeed major problems at CAP and I am actively fighting to regain control of the community and company I founded. I am banned at CAP so I will use all outlets available to me to stay in touch with online gambling community. I am hopeful that a resolution can be reached, but because Warren Jolly removed all company funds from our bank accounts last Friday and is not accepting my calls, has blocked me on Skype and blocked my emails to anyone on my staff at Affiliate Media Inc its difficult to imagine that happening.

"I am actively pursuing this with legal counsel and I ask everyone to assist me in anyway possible way to correct this grave injustice. Please vote with your pens, checkbooks and keyboards and until the Professor is restored to the community I would ask that the Programs who have known me and worked with our community for years tell Mr. Jolly no more support until you do what's right.

If he is willing to do this to the majority shareholder of the company just imagine what he will do to you if I am disallowed to keep him in check. I also ask all affiliates of CAP to demand the Professor be readmitted to CAP immediately."

Questions remained as to the viability of what had become quite a successful business model in recent years. The CAP networking events typically attract over 1000 online casino affiliates and operators, but it is Fabiano and Alex Pratt who are often identified with the organizational functions. Jolly is more the "party guy" who spends much of his time socializing with a handful of CAP members. It is common to attend one of these events and not event bump into Jolly.

In the past, Jolly has been reprimanded for his attempts to bed Senior International Correspondent, Jenny Woo.

"He would fly into Miami and try to arrange for me to work at CAP events behind management's backs, lying and cheating, thinking he could get into my pants," Woo said. "I would just play him like a fiddle, get a free meal and drinks, then report back to Management."

Woo admits she missed attending the CAP events, however.

"They were lots of fun and I made so many wonderful affiliate friends, plus I really like Lou and his wife," she said.

There was also some question as to whether Alex Pratt would remain with the organization. Other similar organizations have expressed interest in having Pratt work for them in a similar capacity though it was not immediately known if Pratt had accepted any offers.

Did Absolute Poker Accidentally Lend Itself Out To Cheat Scams?

During an online tournament at Absolute Poker, some players became suspicious of how another player was winning. After the tournament, the player who finished second filed a complaint and requested a copy of hand histories for the tournament. This is usually a routine matter, and poker websites provide such information whenever requested. But in this particular instance, Absolute Poker inadvertently supplied more data than just hand histories. The file they sent appeared to be gibberish at first, but upon further analysis, actually revealed all hole cards for all players as well as IP addresses and other proprietary info. In other words, the poker website accidentally revealed a veritable gold mine of information.

This data shows a cheating scheme that may be linked directly back to Absolute Poker itself!

An observer came into this poker room and apparently informed the winning player of all other hole cards during the tournament. For example, the player in question folded his two hands before this observer entered the room, and then folded no other hands for about twenty minutes until he folded pre-flop when another player held a pair of kings. This type of playing continued throughout the entire tournament.

And it gets worse. This observer was apparently in cahoots with Absolute Poker. His IP address and account name traces to the servers that host Absolute Poker. This evidence that an insider at Absolute Poker had access to all hole cards in real time and that he relayed that information to an outside accomplice.

I do not know for certain if cheating occurred in this particular instance, since I was not there. However, if you wish to research the details of this matter yourself, visit the TwoPlusTwo forums and the CasinoSmak blogs. There, you will find plenty of information regarding this incident.

When you play poker online, at any poker website, your relationship with that website is one ultimately based on trust. Whether or not other players are cheating you, you should, at the very least, be able to trust that the poker website itself is not cheating you.

The poker websites are forever bragging that they do not allow cheating. They boast about their sophisticated technological methods to track and prevent all forms of And the vast majority of players believe this message. Yet, I ask you, who is policing the poker websites themselves? Who is there to assure that the operators of these websites are not themselves bilking their customers?

The next time someone tells you that cheating at online poker is impossible these days and it never happens, recall the evidence of this incident at Absolute Poker in October of 2007. Armed with this knowledge, you will venture forth a wiser individual and a more discerning consumer of online poker.

Mike "The Mouth Matusow" Mouths Off Against UltimateBet Cheat Russ Hamilton and Claims He Was One Of the UB Scam's Biggest Victims!

It appears that former World Series of Poker Main Event champion Russ Hamilton doesn’t have a friend in Mike Matusow. In a radio appearance Wednesday Matusow tore into Hamilton, the key figure in the UltimateBet superuser scandal.

“I know this, the man is 100% guilty. There’s not even 99%, there’s no two ways about it. I know people, I’ve talked to the CEOs of UltimateBet, I’ve seen the evidence and there’s no way I will let this man walk. I don’t care what it takes for him to go to jail.”

Appearing on the Hardcore Poker Show on Hardcore Sports Radio Matusow admitted he may have been amongst the biggest victims of Hamiltons cheating ways, losing to the 1994 World Champion during heads-up matches in late 2005.

“I want him in jail because of what he’s done to me. This man would call me to play him head-up. I would ship $50,000, $50,000, $50,000. All the money I won when I won the ‘05 World Series Main Event, when I got to the final table and when I won the Tournament of Champions, I gave all to Russ to put on UB while he was playing me head-up and stealing it from me,” admitted Matusow who won a combined $2,000,000 for his ninth place finish in the 2005 Main Event and his win in the 2005 WSOP Tournament of Champions. “The thing about it is I’ve got a couple of issues, of ways around that I think legally, that I can get him put in jail and I’m going to be pursuing it as soon, probably towards the end of the year after my book comes out and after the World Series.”

While the money lost is a significant sum of money it’s not what bothers Matusow the most. He claims that the sessions ruined his confidence and took him from the pinnacle of his game to being a more timid player incapable of making the proper plays.
“It’s not so much what he stole from me, okay, UB gave me a very, very good share back. It’s probably half of what was taken from me. It’s what it did to me mentally. The fact that I was the most feared No Limit poker player in the world up until 2005. I was able to read cards better than any human alive. I could make any move in the world and pick people off at every bluff. And now I have no heart at all,” said Matusow, showing his trademark humility. “Now I play so tight and solid and I’m afraid to pull the trigger because I’m always afraid of getting called because of the fact that every time I made those moves I got called by bottom pair or no pair and all that stuff while I was getting cheated out of all that money. With the mental aspect … it’s basically a lot of what my lawsuit is possibly going to be about.”

Matusow wasn’t the only one cheated though and he mentioned another well-known high stakes online poker player who was taken for a large score and had his confidence destroyed at the same time, “Spirit Rock”.

“The two people that got beat the most was Prahlad Friedman and me. We were the ones that at the time, this is before I was with Full Tilt, that played on UB 24/7. And we got probably the most money back. I mean Prahlad got destroyed, he completely … me and him talked for four hours. What they did to him was just brutal.”

The three-time WSOP bracelet winner also called out other players who may have been cheated for not being vocal enough about the situation. Matusow hopes his high profile will help generate more momentum as the poker community seeks a way to bring Hamilton to justice.

“The thing is most poker players are a bunch of pussies and they’re scared and they don’t want to be involved. See, I’m a big name player that got screwed over. All these other players are no name players and they don’t really care. See you put somebody who’s one of the top three names in poker out there and that changes a lot.”