Hi 2p2, I’m a 6m and HU player on iPoker by the username of “jajay1963”. I met José in a strategy skype group which was set up by TooCuriousso1 to discuss HU strategy amongst good players.

José’s strategy contributions to this group were exceptional, and many top players were very impressed. Early in July, José created a second group which he said was for the best players to further discuss strategy, review each others videos and do some live sweats, to discuss hands just after they had happened. José and everyone elses’ strategy discussion continued to be very good and in early July, somewhere around the 10th, Joséwatched 2p2 poster ImFromSweden whilst he played a session. During this session IFS played sauron1989 HU on iPoker. IFS lost just over $10,000 in 70 hands of $10/$20 but both of them typed into the skype chat group that they thought that this sauron1989 was very bad. About 10 days later, José offered to watch me whilst I played a session on iPoker. Thinking that this was a good opportunity for me to have my play reviewed by a top player, I agreed and he watched my session start out as a 6max session but soon I had sat with sauron1989 on an empty 6max table, after José had told me that this guy was bad and spewy and proceeded to lose a total of $21,900 to sauron1989 over the course of 2 matches at $25/$50. I felt like something was wrong during the matches, not a feeling I can explain, but it just didn’t feel like any other HU match I’ve played and I got suspicious.

After reviewing the skype chat logs, it became fairly clear that José was massively pushing this sauron1989 to anybody who had iPoker funds, saying that he was very bad and that everyone should play him (and let him watch when they did). I voiced my concerns to TooCuriousso1 and we proceeded to work hard to dig up evidence to prove this. Lots of circumstantial evidence was available; José’s chat logs were extremely suspect, where he would push players to play sauron1989 despite not seeming to play him himself. We soon witnessed that whenever José would disconnect from skype, sauron1989 would sign out of the ipoker lobby and would sign back in when José reconnected to skype. This happened 3 times in 20 minutes and all 3 times both José’s skype and sauron logged out and in at the same time. During our attempts to find more evidence, it became clear that José was also operating under the username of dollarman223 on the Merge network. He scammed TooCuriousso1 for $900 and appeared to be setting up another member of the group for a further scam at $50/$100, which we anticipated would be his biggest scam. Once we voiced our concerns to the rest of the group it became apparent that José was setting up quite a few of them for a scam.

Obviously it was naiive and stupid of me and of the others to allow José to watch our screen whilst we played high stakes, but based on a few months of internet friendship and the great strategy José posted, we believed he was entirely trustworthy (despite the scepticism voiced in José’s NVG thread).

To José’s credit, before we had fully conclusive proof, though our suspicions were becoming apparent, he confessed what he had done, and promised to pay us back all of the money plus was adamant that he would pay compensation for the time that we had been forced to put in to unearth the cheating. We have been promised reimbursement for the money stolen by Jose while superusing. Once I receive the funds, I will then send IFS and TC what they are owed.

edit: regarding the confession, a full confession was only really received after it was already more or less apparent that we already knew that we had been cheated.

I'm going to be taking a break for a while. There is no right or wrong way to say any of this, so I'm just going to say what happened.


A while ago, I did something stupid. A friend of mine, who I introduced to poker, made a suggestion to me which was, I'm not going to sugar coat it, cheating. I had introduced this friend to poker and he was losing money, badly. He asked to play some of my poker friends and said why don't you sweat them and we'll see their hands. I don't know why I agreed. I don't know why I did it. I guess it was a mixture of guilt and stupidity and feeling ****ty for getting him involved in something which seemed to be bad for him.

This went on for a short while but I felt so bad, I had to say something. I confessed. I told the guys involved what I had done, I told my friends and the people who I respect and who respected me.

I told my Mum, confessed everything to her. I could see the disappointment moving across her face as she told me she was not proud of me despite all my success in poker; she was not proud of her son. She said how she hadn't raised me this way and what had poker done to me. Thats when it hit me, how badly I had let people down. I felt ashamed, I had no explanation; explanations don't cut it in situations like this and often come across as excuses.

There is a quote on the wall in my school which I always see as I pass the nurse's office. It says that the real mistake is not tripping up, but staying down. I thought of that and that's why I'm writing this.

I'm holding my hands up and taking whatever consequences come. I realise the severity of this, but I also realise that I have to take responsibility for my actions and so I'm paying back everyone involved and in addition paying them compensation of $30,000. I've also told my sponsor etc and whatever happens there I will take the consequences too. They have been really amazing to me and I've enjoyed every minute of working with them. Representing Lock and being part of their amazing team, witnessing the incredible growth, was a pleasure and an honor.

I'm young, I made a mistake and I hope that this doesn't define me; I hope that how I deal with this and move forward is the thing that does. And people will say I have no excuse and I know and understand that. I agree. I just want to let everyone know, I'm sorry. I apologise to the guys who lost their money, the people who I love and care about and I have disappointed and the guys in the poker world who have supported me for letting them down. I wish Ish I had something to say to you all, to say to my parents and my friends and all of those who thought I could do no wrong.

Again I'm really sorry.

I was one of the players in the strategy chat we made with Jose, Moss and a few other HSNL HU players. Jose came clean after suspicions from Moss, TooCurious and other HSNL-players; what has been writen is unfortunately true, but so far it's been handled well by the other guys and, as mentioned, Jose is paying all the money back as well as compensation.

-Henrik

I agree with OP. To be exact though the amount I lost was $842 to dollarman223 on Merge.

-Nick

Confirmed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeP6CpUnfc0

I was shocked when Kjemmy brought this to my attention and could barely believe it.

I have (informally) coached/chatted with Jose for over year now since he somehow got my skype and showed he had a sharp poker mind. I did this because I admired his drive to improve and he seemed like a nice kid who could go far in poker. Jose offered me large sums of money for private coaching which i refused in order to talk strat/general bull**** over skype for free. I have repeatedly vouched for him on 2p2 as well.

Kjemmy brought these suspicions to my attention which I dismissed as circumstantial (until IP addresses were confirmed or Jose confessed) because I felt that the scam was so flagrantly unethical and poorly conceived that I couldn't imagine Jose or anyone rational doing it. That same day, Jose advised me on skype chat to put money on ipoker and play "this aggrofish sauron1989 at 50/100" and I still was not convinced he was scamming.

I suppose the only constructive thing that can come from writing this post is that I want to advise other poker players to be extremely, extremely wary of others' intentions, especially when so many interactions occur online. There are many incredibly honest people in poker who have fostered a climate where deals totaling thousands or millions of dollars are brokered on people's word alone, usually without incident. We have to both be more careful about trusting other people these days and we also have to make sure people who behave like Jose are barred from the poker community by any non-violent means possible.

WOW. 30k is not enough compensation. This is pretty terrible. I'd drop him if I was his sponsor. He only fessed up cuz he got caught he was gonna keep doing it and looking for new prey. What a fraud

30k is not enough compensation? sounds like he did more than right if he paid back all losses plus an extra 30k.

also keep in mind that he is likely paying way more than 30k out of pocket because he probably got to keep very little of the money (the money his friend was cheating up in order to gamble more / get unstuck)

i mean he could probably get away with it enough to make loads of money if he kept it when he didn't get caught and paid out double when he did

he's no longer on Lock Poker's Lock Pro list

Gonna take some serious-bizness evidence to get me to believe that there was ever any "friend". Obviously WAY more likely than not that Jose was playing on both accounts at the same time.

Isn't this evidence more or less conclusive that Jose and the cheater were on the same internet connection? Why anyone buys the existence of a "friend" is beyond me.

The account was never more than $2200 down according to ptr. It's pretty clear there was no friend

OMG... I can't believe what I am reading... why would you do such a thing, Jose'? If you felt bad for getting your friend into poker and watching him lose money, couldn't you just lend him some money or give him some money to get him out of trouble??
What you did, Jose, is vile... you are a huge disappointment for a lot of people... I wanted to become like you one day... you gave me inspiration to study harder... now I am so disappointed that you are just giving me inspiration to quit forever because I can see there's too much "filth" around this game...
Betraying people who put their faith in you and trusted you...I am sorry to say that , but you should really be ashamed of yourself :-(

And even worst than cheating would be if you were making up the existence of your friend... That would be just unforgivable, because it would mean not taking responsibility for your mistakes... paying people $30,000 won't buy you redemption....

I hope your whole story isn't a ponzi scheme, and I'm glad that Sauce didn't fall for your bull****.

At least he came clean. Still once a rapist, always a rapist.

Ugh. Really disappointing.

****ing ridiculous, it's pretty terrible to cheat against unknowns, but to cheat your "friends" in this way, just as pathetic as it gets.

***** joke, had this guy on skype for a while now, thought he was a good guy, after this and the bluff challenge bull**** his credibility is 0.

LOL

What a crazy story, and agree w/ sauce, he needs to be completely banned from the poker community.

don't need to repost what i said in nvg, but succinctly: this is not okay, you dont get given a second chance after this under any circumstances, i want to make sure everyone is very clear on this.

Definately agree with this.

It is slightly reassuring that the repercussions will far exceed $30,000. There are definately times where monetary compensation just does not suffice, and this is one of those.

agree that 30k is NO WAY enough compensation. the guy was clearly going to try to scam for much more than 30k and had he never been caught, the players were obviously never getting their money back and would probably be the victims of futures scams from Girah. Luckily he was bad at scamming and got caught. I hope that he can somehow be brought to justice in Portugal( not sure if possible) as this is a pretty bad case of internet fraud with a confession.