Full Tilt Poker CEO Ray Bitar has surrendered to the US Government

Debi

Debi

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It is now being reported by multiple places that it is confirmed that Ray Bitar has surrendered to the US government.

It was first reported at 2p2 by the same poster who reported that poker stars was negotiating to buy full tilt poker. This is a copy of the email he reportedly sent to staff:

To all Dublin Staff,

By now you probably have heard that I have returned to the US to deal with civil and criminal case that are pending against me in New York. We have all worked hard over the last 15 months to preserve Full Tilt’s assets and potential in order to provide for the repayment of all players, and that continues to be our top priority. It is as important as ever that we all do everything possible to make that happen and, hopefully our deal with Poker Stars will very soon make our goal a reality. My return to the US is part of this process.


I am particularly grateful to all of you here in Dublin for your hard work, patience and understanding during this difficult time. I believe that your hard work and dedication should not go unrecognized, and we have made arrangements for Poker Stars to guarantee all July salaries. You should therefore have no concern about coming to work during this period. After that, we expect that your employment contracts will be assumed by the buyer of the company’s assets.


For those that need to reach me, I expect to continue to be available by email and phone starting late Monday, New York time.


In the meantime, please refer any operational questions to **REDACTED**, and any HR questions to **REDACTED**.


Thank you all again.


Kind regards,


Raymond J Bitar

Pokernews tweeted that is was confirmed.

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danprince10

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Looks like full tilt $$ will be back soon then.
 
long_bong

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All my monies is locked up on UltimateBet :s I have minimal amount on fulltilt.

Good news I guess!
 
GOIVIT

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It looks like the process keeps grinding along, maybe we will see our money some day. :rolleyes:
 
fletchdad

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subing

Wow, sounds ... uhhh..... hopeful?
 
beardyian

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run out of money has he lol :D
 
O

only_bridge

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Not sure what this means, but I highly doubt there's ever gonna be any repayments.
 
alaskabill

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Most important thing is pokerstars paying the July salaries. Very good sign. Hopefully everyone gets paid soon.
 
absoluthamm

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I agree, I could care less about his apologies, I think it is very positive that he mentioned everything with Stars as there really haven't been any other updates mentioning any of that in a while.
 
Debi

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Not sure what this means, but I highly doubt there's ever gonna be any repayments.

Most important thing is Pokerstars paying the July salaries. Very good sign. Hopefully everyone gets paid soon.

Kind of difficult to realize PS is paying the FT salaries and to think at the same time we will not get repaid. That is a very positive sign.
 
B

BluffYou123

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Good news but I wouldn't get carried away about it.
 
MasterOfDisaster

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Would be a nice xmass present :)
 
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glad to see some news coming out.i had very little funds on ft.at least he's facing his problems head on.if poker stars does buy them its no diff to me as i rarely played on either site. glad i cashed at ub before all this went down.the biggest thing with me is not the funds but the effect on the forums and online poker in general since black friday.lower gurantees and less forum fr's makes winning and keeping br harder.
 
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Hell, it's so damn hard to make a deposit nowadays. It's really taken most of the fun out of the game for me online. I hope that some day the casino's or big poker sites like Stars can work something out with the US government to get this back on.
 
M

mhille

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Just read an article about this. I guess he got what he had coming to him. He should have just stayed in ireland.
 
Charade You Are

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Just read an article about this. I guess he got what he had coming to him. He should have just stayed in Ireland.

You're kind of missing the point. Sounds like he had to in order for Stars to get FTP. Gotta hand it to the DOJ, they're good at extortion.

Bottom line is these guys are getting a slap on the wrist, the DOJ got to steal millions of $, getting more in fines, and we lost the ability to play the biggest site in the world and have had to suffer the inability to use payment processors like the ROW can, not to mention the use of our bankrolls from AP/UB/FTP. Another congressional success story.

Course if you are the AG, you get to ignore contempt of congress and have the AG that works for you decline to prosecute. (Sorry for the rant-the DOJ just makes me see red.)
 
mrmonkey

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Kind of difficult to realize PS is paying the FT salaries and to think at the same time we will not get repaid. That is a very positive sign.

Yeah, that was a nice "tell" that the article gave. I'm very surprised they've retained employees through this entire ordeal.
 
O

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Kind of difficult to realize PS is paying the FT salaries and to think at the same time we will not get repaid. That is a very positive sign.

True, but can they really manage to solve everything with all parts involved?
And do they really want to do that?

Im thinking maybe PS's goal is to show enough "goodwill" in terms of wanting to repay all players, and then finaly bail out from the whole thing claiming it turned out to be too complicated.
That way they can say they are on the players side, and that will probably be enough for them to get a US license and probably most of the US market.
 
C

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All my monies is locked up on UltimateBet :s I have minimal amount on fulltilt.

Good news I guess!

That's bad, where are the UB representants? Never saw anything from them..
 
moemtg

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Watch Damages Season 3... every time I watch season 3 and see Luis Tobin it reminds me of Full Tilt's CEO.
 
evildoesit2003

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Hopefully it will return some day.
 
Charade You Are

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Government Files Motion to Deny Bail for Bitar

Dudes in big trouble-wonder what's really going on behind the scenes. If he's got all that money stashed away, why did he come back?

http://diamondflushpoker.com/2012/0...r-bitar-conditions-satisfied-but-bail-stayed/

Even after the license regulator, Alderney Gambling Control Commission, (A.G.C.C.), pulled the plug and forced Full Tilt to cease operations on June 29, 2011, Bitar continued as CEO claiming his presence was essential to get any deal done that could repay the company’s player base. The government also asserts that Bitar received over $2 million in salary between April 15, 2011 and when he surrendered.

In their memo to support denial of bail, the government also points out that the new charges that Bitar faces (various fraud charges against the players, unsealed and presented upon his landing in the U.S.) carry such a significant upward departure in federal sentencing guidelines, that Bitar, now possibly facing life in prison, has all the more reason to flee, even though he has only just arrived.
 
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