Thx for the reply Rich and didnt mean no disrespect.... You said: "NOT MUCH WAS SEIZED DIRECTLY FROM THEM" from all indications 5-7 million was seized and I know of 5 guys personally who had large 6 figures on there(myself included). From everything I read you basically suggest the DOJ is doing a fine job regarding this issue???????? Let me ask you something for argument sake, if you had, lets say 2 million dollars of your own hard earned $$$ locked on the site, would you be pissed off you didnt get a small % weather it be 5% or whatever back if it was seized like you said it was??? I think this is a fair question. And as far as getting back the rest, I highly doubt you can suggest that the DOJ has done a great job "SHOPPING THE ASSESTS" WHO? WHAT? HOW MUCH?? where is a simple spreadsheet?? What exactly are they trying to sell??? I just think the department of "JUSTICE" hasnt done much for the players in this case? Am I missing something here, besides the 75k I had stolen??? Plz respond Rich Ty

Why is this not a ponzi scheme but FTP was? Neither had funds to pay players.

It's 1 thing to say "not much was seized from them" well how come that figure has never been officially released? & I take it your the head of the PPA yet even u cannot give that figure. Saying they "didnt seize that much" has as much value as saying they seized ten billion dollars NEITHER CAN BE VERIFIED BY AMYONE EXCEPT THE OWNERS & THE DOJ & for some reason neither side will. When this all went down I had a little birdy tell me they had 80 million seized the majority of which was through their European payment processor. Just a guess but I think their deal in the end was well keep the money & u won't get charged with anything

Basically they were to scared to take on the biggest kid in the schoolyard



Pokerstars had the exact same set up but were insanely cashed up & smarter about it, they also had their entire funds seized from their payment processors 500 million. BUT on top of that they had ANOTHER 500 million sitting in a seperate players account. So they were doing it exactly the same as UB & Tilt. & lets not forget the owner of Stars was forced to step down as part of the 'DOJ deal' for his part in committing 'fraud' just like Tilt & UB were

[QUOTE=The Ponzi scheme allegations against FTP were based on that site running day-to-day operations on player balances, perhaps hoping to bridge a cach gap, but it was a very dangerous strategy for the players.

This really is on UB/AP. Players didn't paid back because they didn't have the money for repayment.[/QUOTE]

The Ponzi scheme allegations were all part of damaging the online poker site brands that were breaking the UIEGA. There was no Ponzi, it's confirmed Tilt had 95%+ of players money on hand just not in a neatly bundled 'players account'

This is the type of BS thinking that drives me crazy FTP had all their/our money seized THATS WHY THEY 'didnt have the ***** funds'

It's simple u run a business your employee wages are $100,000 a week & your business makes $110,000 a week. Now $100,000 of that gets put into your payment processor & u put the $10k profit under your bed or spend it on Coc & hookers. Then 1 week big ol' Uncle Sam comes along & seizes that $100,000 from the bank. Because they told u it was 'fraud' to use a payment processor. Now u tell me how are u suppose to pay those wages?????

Pokerstars had kept alot of their profit which allowed them to have double what they needed on hand, credit to them & that's why they become & still are the biggest & most successful site. Smart business & low costs. FTP had all the owners & pro's etc to pay out who wanted their money each week, short sited but never the less not the reason they didnt have the money to pay the wages. (they had it but it was stolen/seized)

Your post shows a stunning lack of understanding and seems to rely on the old trope that the Gummint is responsible for all of societies ills. That companies could actually be crooked seems lost on you.

Grover, I generally respect your thinking, but how would you respond to UB/AP victim's questions above? Doesn't it seem clear that the DOJ hasn't handled this situation anywhere near optimally? Of course companies can be (and in this case were) extremely crooked, but often government is as well. Why do you think the DOJ got involved in the first place? Was it not basically just a giant money grab, and essentially legalized theft from US (and non-US) citizens? Is killtime incorrect on stating that the exact amount seized has not been released?

The thing is we don't know what the gov seized in relation to UB/AP. It runs from Brent Beckley saying he could get players 75% of their money back from processors to essentially zero. My guess is the actual amounts Cereus could pull together were very low in 2011 prior to BF. Site traffic after 2008 was flatlining and the shell corp declared bankruptcy in order to walk from shareholder obligations.

Did the DoJ get money from processors tied to UB/AP? Prolly some, but as DTM says that money is long gone from a player standpoint so it seems weird to keep rehashing it here. Can the DoJ get creative? I think so, but with the way they handled the software asset over the last year suggests it is a longshot. There are no wealthy Israeli's to squeeze and they won't even declare what was clearly a fraudulent operation to be a fraud. Aside from both company owner groups cheating players, things like interest bearing deposits, preferred payouts to some affiliates, etc suggest at least some evidence of fraudulent activity. To me, two of the ripest targets would be the KGC and Pierson's US based company but both would require a level of player commitment that doesn't (and never will) exist.

Whether it was a moneygrab by SDNY is unclear, imo there was probably very little actual cash seized from UB/AP surrogates. There were probably some fairly large accounting line items (receivables). The 5-7m seizure is something I am not familiar with, our research determined that was the amount of cash on hand after BF, not the amount seized.

And that money was definitely doled out by Leggett in a manner that was not fair. Some "friends" got taken care of.

From a pokernews article:

The amended complaint, goes on to lay out details, including assertion that as of March 21, 2011, FTP owed approximately $390 million to players around the world, with $150 million owed to U.S. players. FTP only had $60 million on deposit in its bank accounts, however, meaning over $300 million is owed to players worldwide.

This was the result of FTP’s payment processing channels becoming so disrupted that “the company faced increasing difficulty attempting to collect funds from players in the United States. Rather than disclose this fact, Full Tilt Poker simply credited players’ online gambling accounts with money that had never actually been collected from the players’ bank accounts. Full Tilt Poker allowed players to gamble with — and lose to other players — this phantom money that Full Tilt Poker never actually collected or possessed.”

Not only that, but the complaint alleges that between April 2007 and April 2011, Bitar, Lederer, Ferguson and Furst lined their own pockets with approximately $443,860,529.89 of players’ money.


Sure doesn't sound like they had all the money

The DoJ seized their web domain and shut down the site. They also seized in-transit money from payment processors. It's not like they kicked down Cereus' doors and seized money in their possession.

Yes, plenty of money is missing. Some was seized from payment processors. Some may have been used by Cereus. I don't know, but it's Cereus' debt to pay. They should have either kept it on hand or shut down when they did not. Same goes for FTP, IMO.

I'm still waiting for my FTP remission of around five figures. While not $2 million, I was stripped of my intended livelihood (I was doing a ton with PPA at the time, but as an unpaid volunteer...I made my income at the tables).

I hear heartbreaking stories of people who have had their lives torn from them.

So, yes, I want players to get their money back, and even 5% is better than nothing, as you say. I've fought hard to do everything in my power to make repayment happen.

That being said, I'm not aware of any money seized directly from Cereus on Black Friday. It was their responsibility to be solvent.

DoJ hasn't charged Cereus with anything, unfortunately. Without a fraud charge, there's no remission. And, without money, there's no remission. PPA reached out to DoJ with every scenario under the sun to figure ways to get some remission for players.

I think it is, although they've not been charged.

They shopped the FTP assets because there was something of value. It's unclear what Cereus has of value. They had old software, a bad name, and primarily US-based customers.

From Wiki "The indictment also alleged that the executive officers of the sites had sought investment in SunFirst Bank in Utah, which they were using to obtain and pay out player funds by allegedly mis-coding transactions.[16] Although no one was actually being defrauded per se, and money from an otherwise legal operation can not be "laundered",[15] these actions form the basis for the fraud and money laundering charges.[16] This case marks only the second time that the Department of Justice has alleged violations of the 2006 UIGEA,[24] (after the indictment of Daniel Tzvetkoff)."

This is what all the fraud charges are essentially about..

"The indictment named eleven individuals who were each charged with four crimes.[17] The persons named in the indictment are:[3]
Isai Scheinberg, founder of PokerStars
Paul Tate, Director of Payments for PokerStars
Raymond Bitar, CEO of TiltWare - software company for Full Tilt Poker
Nelson Burtwick, Directory of Payments TiltWare (current)- software company for Full Tilt Poker. Past Director of Payments for PokerStars
Scott Tom, part owner of Absolute Poker
Brent Beckley, Director of Payments and Risk Management at Absolute Poker (as of 2007)[citation needed]
Ryan Lang, payment processor
Ira Rubin, payment processor
Bradley Franzen, payment processor
Chad Elie, payment processor
John Campos, Vice chairman of the board and part-owner of SunFirst Bank"

Yes Pokerstars are right at the top of the list of committing this fraud, yes pokerstars were doing all the same fraud. If u ever play on pokerstars u are playing on a site that has committed multiple fraud offences in the past & the owner is not allowed to run his own company anymore.

Why doesnt anyone say that about Pokerstars? because they put up a further 500 million of their own money over & above what the DOJ seized. Hey credit to them & now for just under 500 million of their own money they own the 2 biggest sites.

Also worth noting that Partypoker settled for 105 million to avoid any charges even tho they got out of the US market.

The DOJ has legally reaped in 480mill from Stars, 320 million from Tilt xxx from UB/AP & 105 million from Party. Close to 1 billion dollars has been 'legally' ass raped out of the poker community. & here we are 4 years later with their own citizens still waiting on a measly 150 mill to be returned.

Every US citizen not willing to put their hand up & say the DOJ took all this money which anyone with half a brain knows was the players money, should be indicted on fraud charges also because u were also committing fraud by facilitating breaking the UIEGA just like "the dodgy shady fraudsters that took all our money running these sites" when in reality they had most (which isnt good but never the less they had the money) & were't prepared to put up their own funds to cover what the US ass raped from them, remember they were also talking about massive fines on top of the seizures so putting more money in may of ended up being butt fuked out again by the US government



"They shopped the FTP assets because there was something of value. It's unclear what Cereus has of value. They had old software, a bad name, and primarily US-based customers."

The software was great, well after they found the backdoor god mode. As the guy supposedly helping us get some money back how is bad mouthing it helping us. The software was smooth, reliable, resizeable, unique games, a linked casino. Numbers were very workable post BF & frankly if the idiot owners had just continued cashing out $500pw or less even but reliably I believe it would of rebuilt nicely.

80 million is a lot of money but people dont seem to realise what these sites are raking in Pokerstars is upto their 113,000,000 hand at $1 rake a hand average, plus tourney rake. 80 million would not take much to recover.

this is easily the most depressing thread in the history of 2p2

If the PPA can't convince DOJ to charge the current and/or previous owners of AP/UB with fraud then there is more going on here than we are being told.

Rich, this is common sense. We are owed $50m+. There is more evidence against these guys than there ever was against FTP. What is really going on here? WTF is the DOJ not charging the owners with fraud? Is there a conflict of interest? Did one of these guys payoff an insder? I just cannot fathom a legit reason for this not happening.

We all get it, its AP/UB's responsibility to take care of player funds. If I open a company, tell my customers their money is being held in a trust, then steal it all, I'm being charged with a list of crimes and going to jail. There would also be an investigation into where I hid all stolen funds and then a remission process to the victims. How is this not happening? The simple "it was their responsibility" does not fly here. They stole and lied to the tune of $50m, why are they not being held responsible. WTF is really going on here?

Is Mr. Holder for sure the person to talk to? (I haven't heard his name in this thread before tbh). Whoever it is, I would be happy to schedule a meeting with the absolute highest up person we can talk to, and get some definitive answers as well as make the best case possible for using whatever funds they have to pay back player funds.

This thread is starting to make my head hurt. In hopes of keeping (making?) this thread productive, let me re-post what I posted about a month ago:

On February 13, 2014, I called Sharon Cohen Levin at the US Attorneys Office. She picked up when I called and was very friendly. We spoke for about 5 minutes. I didn't take away anything of great value from conversation but thought people might be interested in some parts.

- She said they intend to setup a victims compensation fund for AP players and that they do intend to treat AP players as victims of fraud in "the same manner as FTP victims."

- They are still in the process of liquidating AP assets. Once that is complete, she said they will "take a look" at other areas where AP players could legally be paid from (I specifically asked about frozen bank accounts and the PokerStars settlement funds - she sounded like she genuinely would like to use these sources but would likely be prevented due to certain rules and regulations).

- I asked if this was likely a scenario where we would be paid five cents on the dollar in a couple of years. She responded that she hopes the amount is much more than that and sounded fairly certain it wouldn't take years. She said they are focused on getting the FTP funds all dispersed and then would be focusing more on the AP situation.

Overall, I came away somewhat optimistic that we might see a meaningful amount of funds returned in a somewhat reasonable timeframe. She obviously couldn't give many details, and much information is still unknown, but it was nice to know us AP players haven't been totally forgotten.

Guys, please stop arguing about who stole our money, what money we should be entitled to, if fraud charges should be brought, and if to arrange a meeting with Eric Holder.

If you want to help, call these people at the SDNY DOJ:

Jason Cowly:
2126372479

Sharon Cohen Levin:
2126371060

Michael D. Lockard:
2126372193

Please be polite. Explain you are a victim of the UB/AP poker case and that you are simply seeking an update on the status of your funds. Explain your account balance matters a lot to your financial well-being. Thank them for their time and for looking out for you. They are literally our only hope of receiving some funds, so treat them that way.

To the PPA: You guys are awesome. But is it possible for you to get in contact with any of these guys and get an update? Even clarification on if charging the owners with fraud matters in setting up a remission fund (from my conversation with Sharon Levin, it doesn't matter)? I don't really understand how my five minutes of effort a month ago garnered more information on this matter than anyone/any group has managed to get in many months. I'm willing to put in a lot of effort on this matter, but you guys are uniquely positioned to be more efficient/successful than just me making random phone calls.

To everyone: Please just stop the stupid debates that just don't matter at this point. If you are thinking of making a pointless post, please just pick up the phone and spend the time calling the DOJ numbers above.

Let's make this thread productive and a source for information.

I still don't understand why we can't file a class action (or other) lawsuit against KGC for negligence.

No. The sole differentiator is that FTP had assets for player repayment and Cereus did not. Some here say they did, but did anyone buy UB/AP and restart it, like we saw with Full Tilt?

DoJ didn't dip into funds seized from payment processors to repay FTP players. It all came from fines paid by PokerStars when they purchased FTP's assets.

Not everyone thinks we deserve our money back, unfortunately. Some in Congress wanted new legislation to preclude the federal government from assisting players defrauded by unlicensed sites. A couple want to put us in jail for playing unlicensed sites.

So, it's no intuitive that DoJ wants to put resources toward repaying players of offshore sites. In fact, if we were not organized, I question if it would have happened with FTP.

As for charges, I imagine they were looking for the minimum needed to shut down the sites they had under investigation. There was apparently plenty of evidence for FTP. Perhaps it was not as glaring for Cereus. I don't know, but they were shut down.

If a US-based company did this, the investigation would focus a lot on defrauded consumers. The difference here may have been that these are offshore sites the DoJ felt were operating unlawfully.

PPA continues to seek assistance from DoJ in this matter, but it's a real long shot at this point.

Game set match!! Last time I post, FU DOJ, FU HELLMUTH, FU PIERSON, I will be at the WSOP the entire month of June if I see Hellmuth at the table/hallways good chance I punch him in his stupid looking face...... GL ALL and Thx again Rich

Just posting again-

I would be happy to go meet with any person with power at the DOJ to have a direct face to face meeting to discuss our player funds. I believe strongly that the DOJ should pay players back what they can, and I believe I can have a very rational, classy conversation about this.

TheEngineer- which person in particular would you suggest I try to schedule the meeting with?

Who are the members of Congress that want to "put us I'm jail for playing unlicensed sites"? What utter garbage! Where did you get this info, engineer? How many millions of US citizens have played 'unlicensed poker sites'? How did the USA get to this point? These people have no business in our government. Can you provide names of these Congressmen, along with when/where they said this? What a joke our country is.

Also, how is it 'a real long shot at this point'? How can your info be so drastically contradictory to the positive newb07 received when speaking directly with the DOJ? Maybe donkiman is correct in that something is way off here. Any rational person can see that the DOJ are essentially thieves manipulating the law to steal from its people (along with people outside its borders). That's the only reasonable explanation here- they saw millions of dollars floating around cyberspace, and wanted to find a way to legally take (ie steal) as much of it as possible. Does the DOJ actually do anything that benefits its citizens?

+11111

The DOJ has run a blatant mis-direction ploy that 9/10 players just cant see. Everyone is so focused on how FTP & Cereus owners have defrauded them & which pro's from these sites they want to punch out on site. because well the DOJ & FBI call them fraudsters (& Pokerstars are also charged). Meanwhile the DOJ has 1 BILLION dollars that they've taken from the poker economy. Of course that 1 BILLION dollars was taken to protect us from these UIEGA dodging 'fraudsters' lucky for us

Do you even have funds on Cereus?

Here's one:

PA lawmaker wants to penalize illegal online gaming [philly.com]

...state Rep. Mario Scavello wants to set up a road block to web-based wagering.

The Monroe County Republican on Tuesday outlined a plan to penalize people who gamble online, which is illegal but not punishable in Pennsylvania...

...Scavello’s bill would aim to curb that, making first violation a summary offense that carries a possible $300 fine and up to 90 days in jail. A second violation would be a misdemeanor bringing a chance of a $2,500 fine and up to a year in jail.

“I believe that if you hit people in their wallets, we can start to crack down on the lawbreakers,” Scavello said....

US Federal Government Budget: ~$3 Trillion
DOJ Budget: ~27 Billion

DOJ employees are salaried, not one dime of poker money seized goes into their pockets.

If it was a money grab, instead of getting FTP/PokerStars players paid back, they could have just doubled the fine amounts and kept the money. They didn't.

I get the hate for the DOJ here, but the idea that they went after online poker as a money grab is nonsense.

Bahahaha!