Dustin Woolf, Thomas Koral Among UB Superuser Victims Suing Excapsa
According to an article posted on Subject: Pokeron Tuesday, the site’s first entry in a month, eight victims of the much-publicized superuser scandal at UB have filed suit against Excapsa Software, which the suit says was UB’s parent company back in 2006. According to Subject: Poker, the eight individuals filing suit are Daniel Ashman, Brad Booth, Thomas Koral, Greg Laverly, Dave Lizmi, Dan KingDanSmith, Joseph Sander, and Dustin Woolf (pictured), the latter of whom is known in the online poker world as Neverwin.
Subject: Poker Editor-in-Chief Noah Stephens-Davidowitz told PocketFives on Tuesday shortly after the story was published, “I was happy and surprised to see that someone has finally decided to take this to court. I wish it were a class action suit, and I wish it had happened sooner.”
UB officials declined to comment to PocketFives about the lawsuit.
According to the complaint, “Plaintiffs have been damaged in the sum according to proof at trial, but not less than $153,863.50 with regard to Daniel Ashman; over $500,000 with regard to Brad Booth; over $20,000 with regard to Thomas Koral; over $140,000 with regard to Greg Lavery; over $500,000 with regard to Dave Lizmi; over $100,000 with regard to Joseph Sanders; over $20,000 with regard to Daniel Smith; and over $300,000 with regard to Dustin Woolf.” All told, the group is seeking damages totaling around $2 million.
Charges levied in the lawsuit include violation of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICOas it’s commonly called), conspiracy to violate the RICO Act, conversion, interference with prospective economic advantage, intentional infliction of emotional distress, unfair business practices, fraud, and negligence.
The defendants are identified as Excapsa Software and 10 John Does. Interestingly, the suit references a database of hands played on UB from as far back as 2003 that could help unlock even more information about the cheating scandal, which was once featured on an episode of the CBS News program “60 Minutes.” This database was allegedly handed over to UB’s regulating agency, the Kahnawake Gaming Commission.
The suit quotes several TwoPlusTwo threads and various articles as it pieces together the fallout of the superuser scandal that rocked UB. Its text is littered with quotes like the following: “Given the underlying nature of the security breach and UltimateBet’s willingness to protect the identities of the cheaters, it is likely that the cheaters were high-level members of UltimateBet’s management and/or software engineering team and/or its founders and original programmers.”
Why bring the lawsuit? The 47-page filing addresses that question as well: “Cheated players are bringing this action because they believe that only a public and impartial tribunal can accurately determine the full scope of the cheating and the identities of the individuals behind it… [Russ Hamilton (pictured), the man identified as masterminding the cheating] has no computer programming experience and could not have perpetrated the fraud without technical and administrative assistance of other individuals.”
Over 100 user names were involved in the UB cheating scandal, which was largely unearthed on poker forums like TwoPlusTwo and PocketFives. The damage was allegedly around $20 million and UltimateBet was re-branded to UB in 2009.
The legal document adds that the total damages awarded to players could be woefully understated: “An accurate determination of the amount lost by players to cheaters would have to take into account not only money players lost to the cheaters, but also the money they did not win as a direct result of the cheaters’ unfair advantage.”
One of the accounts associated with the scandal, NioNio, was reportedly winning at a rate that was 10 standard deviations above the mean (pictured), the equivalent of winning a one-in-a-million drawing four times in a row. Other accounts associated with the scheme included Sleepless, NoPaddles, nvtease, and FireNTexas. In uncovering the scope of the scandal, officials asserted that the dishonest behavior began in 2003.
After an in-depth history of UB’s ownership, which involves a medley of companies and associated individuals, the lawsuit concludes, “The cheating that occurred at UltimateBet was not the result of some rogue individual, but that it happened with the knowledge, direction, and participation of persons at the very core of Excapsa and its related entities.” Hamilton was never charged and is not explicitly identified as a defendant.
Excapsa is currently undergoing liquidation. The eight players seek “compensatory damages for damage and injury to business or property in an amount yet undetermined,” full restitution, $10 million in punitive damages, treble damages, and attorney’s fees. Read the lawsuit.
