Mods, please move this to the appropriate area if this is not it.

I would also like to make clear right away that I am of the opinion that said horse did not intentionally scam anyone, but made a dumb mistake that he didn't see the whole way through. I am also still considering staking said horse depending on how this pans out.

I have had my second incident in about a week with a horse. This situation is entirely different, however, and we were looking for others opinions. You see, this particular case involves not only me, but another staker as well.

I am going to post my part of the story, and then bignate904 will be following in the next part with his.


On july 10th, I started a thread giving out $11 stakes to the Daily 40 grand:http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/13...y-40-a-826090/. One of the players who I ended up staking in that tournament (as well as in another two tournaments) was legendus. He ran the stake fine, but did not cash. I googled him and checked his posts-there was nothing wrong with him, so I was fine with staking him.

A few days later, I started another post about staking players in MTTs/SnGs for a period of time. I got another inquiry from legendus and was perfectly fine with him based on his past results. Since then I have been staking him in up to $22 tournaments. He has worked up a little ove $600 in MU in the past week. He has been playing well, however, and I had no problem keeping him on as a horse.

Today was when the problem occured. For the first time, he requested to play some tournaments on FTP. I thought nothing of it. I sent him a little over $170 on Tilt to play aschedule that we agreed upon, and he was off. One of the tournaments that he played in was a HU 4K guarantee. He was down to about 16 players left, when I was contacted by bignate stating that legendus was under contract with him to play on FTP, and he had 60% of all of legendus' winnings on FTP. There's the first problem-I had 50% of whatever he won, and Nate belived he had 60%. Nate did not directly pay for his entry to these tournaments, but he had a contract with legendus that he had all of his action. Nate had been staking him for the $3KOs, as well as coaching him. Legendus ended up chopping the last table for just over 1K. He has shipped me all the money. He has not taken anyones money. However, he essentially sold himself at 110% for this tournament according to both of our contracts.

I do not believe that his plan was to screw Nate in anyway. He was going to play the tournaments under my roll, and not use any of the money that Nate had sent him for the tournaments. Howver, he did sign the contract.

I will let Nate fill you in on the rest, I think he's going to do a better job than I will.

***Sorry for any typos, I'm tired as hell, its been a long day***

First I have a partner who stakes with me. He asked to handle this part on the forum. I do however want to explain from our side what happened. Expect more details in the morning.

Earlier this month I posted a thread looking for MTTSNG horses. I found a few. One of them was Legendus. I followed all rules, I had him PM me and reply in the thread he did so. I also quoted his response and said we entered an agreement.

This agreement was a signed contract. He scanned and sent it back with his ID. This was on July 8th (a few days before the other backing arrangement.) In the contract it states clearly he is to play exclusively for us for the duration of the deal. We owned 100% of his action and he wasn't to play any games without our consent. The majority of the games were to be 3$ 90's however he was allowed to mix in some MTT's that I give permission for.

After my session today I looked up our stakee's and see he is playing 26$ tourneys. 32k and the HU game. At first I thought "Omg this horse playing out of his roll". I made contact with him when he told me about the other backer.

First our contract states he's not to enter another backing agreement with anyone else. I have screen shots from the 8th and even up until today.

I have talked with Thess on aim for quite a few hours. He's been more than helpful. He doesn't think this player is scamming I disagree. The math on the screen shots doesn't add up. When he first contacted me on Skype his first statement was "I know you aren't happy with me". He knew what he was doing was wrong. I have convo logs to back this up.

From where I'm standing we had an agreement that started on the 8th. He still had our money in his account. This situation is sticky and I don't know how it should be resolved.

Part of the reason I think he's a potential scammer is.

-He started on the 8th and agreed to play 200 games a week. He's played 97.
- He stood me up for a scheduled lesson to play under the other backing arrangement and said he forgot.
- In PM's he states he knows he should of contacted me but was going to after he seen how these turn out.

All of these are NOT a sign of a reputable player. I will answer any questions and my partner is going to respond with more info. Thanks Thess for all your help and let me know what you need from me to help clear this situation up. I have PM'ed Bobo my Aim and Skype and they have my email.

I would also like to say that I will answer any (legitamate) questions. My goal is to deal with this as fairly as possible for all parties involved. There is nothing in Nate's post as far as details go that I see as false.

its not thess123s fault, he had no clue about clownhorse having another backer on FTP. bignate, he screwed you.

I'm not sure if this guy legendus is a "scammer," but he's certainly an idiot and not very reliable.

In my opinion, the best way to resolve this problem is for Bignate904 to show thess123 this contract, especially the 60/40 split. If Bignate and thess123 split the $1,000 55/45, then I think it shows good co-operation from both parties. Bignate loses 5% as a gesture of good will from 60% and Bignate loses 5% from 50%. I assume this isn't a problem, because thess123 stated: "He has shipped me all the money."

Legendus should get nothing of course for screwing it all up. Ignorance should not be an excuse if a contract has been signed.

It might be more complicated when the contract can be ended at any time and legendus claims to have ended his contract with Bignate (not sure this has happened).

I'm Nate's backing partner. I've glanced at the thread and talked at length with Nate about how we should handle this situation. We don't want to destroy the reputation of another player in this community. There were mistakes made, but probably just that: mistakes and not specific intent to steal from any backing group.

Our signed agreement with the player indicates that we have an exclusive deal for all play, effective July 8th 2010. Player did not ask to be released, nor alert us to the fact that he was seeking other backing arrangements. This was in direct violation of his backing arrangement with our group. I don't plan to make the whole of our backing agreement public, but would be happy to provide scans of relevant sections, along with the signature page.

The player, having a signed, exclusive backing arrangement, acted upon that agreement and accepted funds from our backing group. Player then sought and received other backing and accepted new backing funds. He began play for a second backer within the past week. Last night, player became profitable by winning a mid-stakes HU tournament. It is not knowable who's money purchased the buy-in for any tournament. It would be nice to parse the situation that cleanly, but the FT account had co-mingled funds, so nobody has clear view to the owner of each individual buy-in.

Both backers have been harmed by players actions. We propose a solution that attempts to be reasonable for both. We ask that instead of 60% as allowed by our agreement, 40% of player profit be sent to our group. We will release the player from our agreement and wish him good luck.

I want to be clear; I have no idea what his intentions where. We hope that he made a mistake and if that is the case, then we hope that he continues as a successful player and contributor to the poker community. This solution seeks to recognize that thess123 was harmed and offers reasonable compensation. The player committed a significant mistake and hopefully learns from it.

it seems pretty clear that if the horse had asked nate to play in those tournaments, nates response would have been "no", so its hard to justify getting a piece of that action, irrespective of any legal document. I'm sure nate wouldn't want to be seen as attempted to freeroll said action in tournaments, and if the horse had busted, he wouldn't have been on here writing a long post trying to enforce the horse to send thess the money back for the buyins, and to deduct the buyins for the tournament from his working bankroll.

thess should keep his action, and I wouldn't be surprised if this signed document was meaningless/unenforcable in a legal sense!

Just for the record, legendus has been very open with me and has been upfront with me about virtually everything at this point. I obviously can't say the same about the other backers, becasue I don't know.

Ok, Ill tell my story now I guess.

I understand that I've been wrong in this situation. I'm just new here, and I didn't really know what were the standard staking rules. I thought it would be a problem if i would play for 2 different persons, i honestly didn't knew it was a problem.

I do admit that i should've asked them for permission first, but it was an half hour before the tournaments started, and he wasn't there, so I couldn't really get the permission before the tournaments started.

I've got clear screenshots which say that ive received the money from thess to play these tournaments on FTP. I didn't play with their money, I ofcourse know that I can't do it.

Given all of these facts, I know i was wrong, but I think that people are being a bit to hard on me with calling me a scammer. Also I don't think it would be fair if you guys would get a 40% share. I know ive signed the contract, but in the contract there hasn't been stated anything about you guys getting a share of my profits for other backers.

I am willing to talk about this with you guys and come to a solution, but I just think its wrong if u should get 40% share.

I NEVER intented to scam or fool anyone, and I didn't play with your money. I know what I did wasn't correct, but as Obeyan already said, I've made a mistake, and I def. do learn from it.


Hope we just can work this out in a good positive way.

Rather we say Yes or no is irrelevant. He should of never played in those tourneys or been seeking other backing arrangements. He signed a deal stating we receive 60% of ANY action he plays and EXCLUSIVELY for us. That doesn't mean he can ask then play other tourneys.

Furthermore he hasn't played the games he's agreed to because he was playing for another backer. That was time he should of spent playing our games as the rules dictate. Which in the contract it also states if he doesn't play the game we're allowed to adjust our cut accordingly.

The other problem is the screen shots he's sent. The math in his account doesn't add up. Meaning he was playing our money in other games he wasn't suppose to anyways. Who says he hasn't been playing cash or higher buy ins with our money? Where did all of it go?

The other problem is I followed all the rules. I asked Thess why he didn't contact me. I did everything 22 asked of me in the staking part. I made the thread, He replied and I quoted and made it public we entered a deal. The info was out there to prevent this from happening however it would of taken a little more work of the backer. An honest mistake.

I don't think it's very fair to say he gets to keep his cut. The other backer's agreement was never binding due to our contract with said player. If there was a court this would immediately be ruled in our favor since our deal was signed 3 days before the other deal.

The next problem is how do we prevent this from happening again? I have documents which clearly to even idiots can understand they aren't suppose to be playing for other people. I followed all the rules in which 2+2 asked for me to do. As a backer you should research your horses. I did.

The other backer asked if the guy was backed but didn't request screen shots. He said he asked the player if he was backed in which the player replied no. If he would of requested screen shots he'd seen a couple days earlier I had sent him money which in my mind should trigger something. At least an explanation to why I was sending him money.

The bottom line is we have 60% of all his action exclusively from July 8th 2010 for 1 years time The tourney was shipped 7/18/2010. Not sure how we aren't due 60%.

What if he loss? How would this play out then? Would the other backer be forced to part ways with 600$ MU?

Not to mention this document not being enforceable isn't relevant here. All these coaching scams aren't either yet we feel like the scammie's should get compensated right? We wrote up this document so our players would know EXACTLY what is and isn't expected from them.

The contract states you play for us specifically. Here is some of the dialog in which I feel like he had intentions of scamming. In pm when I first asked him why he was playing games here is his response.

"Hey, I was going to email u about this as soon as i was done with these. Im playing these backed by thess123 on 2p2, u can send him a pm for conformation.

Also i will ofc let u see the transaction for it he has made, and show u everything is still OK concerning our BR.

It is OK for me to play those tourneys right? For other people ofcourse. "

First no it's not ok. 2nd if I'm not on you don't play. I asked you before you signed the contract if you had any questions. I make myself available often on Skype and email.

Our Skype convo this was the first thing out of his mouth.
"Think ur not happy with me now, right?" This implies you knew it was wrong but did it anyways.

He also says
the thing is
"i just got excited with his offer, cause its fun + higher stakes, so more attempting to do the the 3.30's"

Well Kevin basically you screwed us all. You sold 110% of yourself with 40% of that against the agreement you have with us. I hope this was an honest mistake but the facts aren't in your favor.

No I didn't think I was doing something wrong when i made the agreement to play those tourneys for him. However, when u mailed me and asked me to get on skype etc etc, I had the feeling I did something wrong, something which I didn't knew was a wrong thing to do.

I did indeed say this, and u reacted with saying u understood that it was a tempting offer, and u didn't react as hard as u did now. I Honestly know that ive made a mistake by doing it.

Screwed? Jeez man, I don't mean this in a bad way, but thats kind of overreacting. I am willing to work something out here, but you need to understand from my point of view that it is kind of annoying if I need to give you guys my share.

I'll get to everything later, but why would I ask for the screen shot of someones Tilt account when hes made over $90K more on Stars and that was where I was staking him?

did legendus play that tourney with thess123 money only, or did he also play it with Bignate904?

I sent him the money right before the tournaments to play them and his thoughts were that he was playing for my, but nates money was in there still, so technically I guess you could say it was both of ours.

excuse me for that, trying hard.

I do think it's better to have a private convo about this tho, instead of insulting eachother of things in this topic.

#1 Did you read the contract? What part of it isn't clear this is against the rules?

#2 I didn't ever condone your actions. I chose my words carefully trying to get the money from a possible malicious player into the hands of someone who I could trust a little more (the other backer)

#3 yes I feel like you screwed me. You owe me 60% of your profits since July 8th which is 600$+. When can I expect payment?


To Thess you've been very helpful. I'm not trying to say you screwed up or this is your fault. I requested screen shots (From the guy with 96k profit) to make sure he wasn't backed by anyone else and to know how much funds were in his account. Also to insure there wasn't any malicious activity going on.

He had both of our funds in his account with a written agreement saying he was playing exclusively for us since July 8th of this year.

where did JL514's response go?

^he is prob editing it.
I dont know if I have got all the facts right or w/e, because at the moment this thread seems a bit messy.

but the way it looks is that you give him the money to play he did hes other backers did not want him to play at that level, he should give you the % split you agreed before hand. and with whatever Legendus has left from the winning can decide to keep it or give it to his stakers.

you said you staked him for other MTTSs and he owes you around $600 mu? if he didnt cash in this would that mean his other stakers would re inbuse you or what?

I deleted my post because there were new replies since I started posting. I didn't mean it as an insult, I meant that it seems to me that you were not intentionally breaking the contract as you didn't understand the terms. Of course that doesn't make it OK, but it makes it more of a mistake than a scam.

I don't think Legundus is a scammer.

I have a strong stance on this matter in general but I don't want my word to be the last. Just know that the mods are watching, and everyone should try to sort this out as civilly as possible. I would recommend asking well respected members of the staking forum for their unbiased opinions as I think this one is pretty clear.

I don't not believe they would, but why would they expect to?

Bignate I do think you are overreacting here and thess123 is handling this much better than you. There is a problem here but for these tournaments he was not playing with your money and was playing with thess123s money so here lies the problem. Should you get 60% of his winning in this tourney...no probably not. Do I think you guys can easily resolve this yes...how about something like 40% to you 40% to thess and 20% to legendus and whatever MU he had he can use his 20% to pay back that money. Dont think this is that big of a deal as you guys are making it out to be at alll. He should not be considered a scammer either because this is not his intentions.

This situation is very sticky and either way on of the backers are getting "screwed". Meaning we aren't getting the amount in which we feel we are entitled to. Since the other backer is in the same shoes as me what I proposed was.

Take the total profit + any amount in his accounts. Take out Both of our MU and split it 50/50. He's agreed to this on Skype and I frankly see no other "Fair" way of handling this situation. I don't feel we owe Kevin's MU to the other guy seeing how he should of never played for the other guy.

I don't know if he was scamming or not. What I'm saying is the money he won yesterday didn't add up in screen shots with the amount he should of had in his account. He had 1199 in his account after his win. He won 2nd for 1169. He cashed in the 32k for 50$. He should of had our 111$ in his account also. It wasn't there it doesn't add up.

If I was the one in bignates shoes, I would, more than likely, be reacting in the same way. I would feel like I deserved my cut.