From: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/news/story?id=6395452

NEW YORK -- Federal prosecutors say they expect Internet poker companies whose employees are being prosecuted to return money to players, and they're reactivating two domain names to make it easier for that to happen.

The government announced Wednesday that it has reached agreements with PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker. It will restore the companies' domain names so they can return money to U.S. players.

The companies were named in a civil money-laundering and forfeiture complaint last week.

Authorities have announced criminal charges against 11 individuals, including employees of those companies and one other.

So far, three of the 11 have been arrested. All are free on bail.

In a statement issued Tuesday regarding the case, ESPN said: "We are aware of the indictment only through what has been announced publicly. For the immediate future, we are making efforts to remove related advertising and programming pending further review."

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

Returning the funds doesn’t appear to be an open and shut case. Within minutes of the Department of Justice announcing the deal, Full Tilt Poker commented in a press release obtained by Poker News Daily, “As a result of the recent enforcement action, there exists no authorized U.S. payment channel through which to make refunds; Full Tilt Poker has no accounting of the millions of dollars of player funds that were seized by the government; and the government has not agreed to permit any of the seized player funds to be returned to the players.”

In the past, and Full Tilt funds seized from a processor was reimbursed by Tilt along with extra for the "inconvenience". I have no reason to think Tilt is going to be changing that policy now, so I believe any funds seized were a loss to Full Tilt and not any player.

  At the very least it's a ray of sunshine in the midst of the storm !!!!!!!!!!!!                   

Except that the backlash from the remaining players on the site would be huge. It would do irreparable damage to their reputation in the rest of the world if all the U.S. players said their funds were seized. People would leave the site in droves.

Of course they want to give the player's their money, but the DOJ has it.

The backlash can be dealt with, just like AP dealt with the backlash of their scandals to be still the #3 site.

Where would the point be for you to draw the line and act upon that backlash?  (I know you don't play on FT very much, but let us explore this avenue for a moment and pretend it is your primary site)

Imagine, one month from now, FT is telling US players- "We would like to refund your money, but the DOJ has seized all the player's funds"
The DOJ says- "We didn't seize the player's funds, we seized FT's funds"

Both of them have their own point of view on this.  The American player is screwed, but you can still play, still deposit, still withdraw and things are profitable for you.  Would a month of this be enough for you to say "I don't trust FT anymore, I am out of here."

Imagine six months from now, same story, FT said, DOJ said.  American player is screwed, but you still have zero problems.  Except now, however, some US sites have started popping up and legislation has been written and passed so US players now have their own sites to play on.  Would you pick up off of FT and go to those US sites after what the DOJ did to FT?

What about a year?  would that be enough for you to throw in the towel and bail on FT?

What about two years, after all of this is long forgotten, except to the poor bastards who haven't gotten their money.  Would that be enough time?  By this point, life has moved on, everyone has a site to play legally.  Would you bail now?

Where is the breaking point for the players who have no problems?  So long as this doesn't affect them, I would say the backlash would be minimal to FT, in so far as what players they have left.  The loss of the US market is devastating to say the least, but that is already a done deal, Unless, of course, you happen to think FT will be let back into the US market one day?  

No, for the European players life goes on.  They have heart felt sympathy for us poor ole US players, but that is not the Euro's problem.  Now, if Euro governments start grumbling, people will get quite anxious very quickly because of all this US nonsense.  Then the backlash comes into play.  Because then, and only then, will people bail because they will see it close to their own home.

American's won't admit it, but we all knew this was coming.  It was only a matter of time before the feds moved against the sites.  The people who got stuck for 1,000's of $ have no one else to blame but their own short sightedness.  You think people will bail because of what might happen, when so many American's who should have known it was going to happen still refused to see. 

That is how the "backlash" will play out.  Nothing but a tiny voice in the back of people's minds which they easily dismiss while they click "log in".

The degenerate does not care or see into the future nor wonder about it.

Just sayin' is all.

Time will tell.
Peace

I wrote this on FTF on August 8, 2010-




When HR 2267 was being thrown around in the US, all the players and the pros and pundits were saying "This will be a good thing for poker!"  I disagreed and tried to warn people of what was really being said in HR 2267.



They (Congress), told EVERYONE the plan.  It's just that people weren't listening and only hearing what they want to hear.

Same goes with this FT and withdraw business.  FT said, in effect, until the DOJ releases the player's money, we won't get a dime.  The DOJ said, in effect, "We didn't seize the player's money". 

What we got is a good ole "Mexican Standoff".

Time will tell, and the time of what I said was coming is now here.  What we have to look forward to in the US?  Some more bending over and all out of vaseline.  It is going to suck bad.  But us poor fools will get used to it and maybe, one day, grow to love getting fricked in the ass.

And  still people will not want to face what is right in front of their eyes.  It is mind boggling to me.  I am all for happy endings, especially at the massage parlor.  Eventually, I hope, we US players will get our money.  But it might be more than just weeks or months away.  This could well drag on for a very long time.

In the meantime, those who think "put pressure on the politicians!" to get this resolved.  I am afraid people aren't looking at how politicians work.  They will use this.  The Dems will blame the republicans in an effort to stave off more landslide election losses.  Heck, the more pissed off people get, the more it benefits people like Franks.  They will suck all the political capital out of this as they can.  That means, the longer this drags out, the better.
I would remind people of who is in charge of the DOJ.  It is the democrats.  They will blame republicans for this, republicans will blame democrats, and each will use this whole affair as political capital.  Organizations like the PPA will use this to try and soak more money out of hopeful players in the form of dues paid.  It is a merry go round that keeps on going and benefits too many parties (except the chump players) for this to be allowed to be resolved quickly.
Think about it.

Peace

Yes, there are no processors.  True enough.  But that is half the problem in regards to FT, from their point of view.  Their official press release after the DOJ announcement that payment processor were going to be opened-

“As a result of the recent enforcement action, there exists no authorized U.S. payment channel through which to make refunds; Full Tilt Poker has no accounting of the millions of dollars of player funds that were seized by the government; and the government has not agreed to permit any of the seized player funds to be returned to the players.”

Now, look carefully at that statement.  The italics is in regards to the processors.  However, look carefully at the bolded.  The government has agreed to allow the players to withdraw, as soon as the processors are set up.  But FT is asking about the actual money that has already been seized.  The DOJ has given no indication what so ever that they are going to release that seized money. 

They (the DOJ) won't release that money unless a court tells them to return it to FT.  Which the DOJ would appeal and so on and so on.  In the meantime, processors will be made available. 

I am predicting at that time, FT might very well not be able to pay out to the players and state that it is the DOJ that is holding the player's funds.  You see in the bolded part that FT is putting it on the DOJ that has our money. 

The DOJ say they don't have the player's money.

This will not be resolved quickly......

This is probably the wrong thread to throw this in (it's just the one I'm reading when the thought comes to me)... but because of all this isn't it more than just a little bit idiotic to just redeposit at a site that hasn't been siezed? (cake, merge, etc....) I'm not saying the feds are going to go after them , but at this point aren't all the people that are just cutting their losses and going to one of those sites just asking to be raped again?
 Sure it could be said that we all knew it was coming and it's our fault for being naive to think that no one would touch the BIG 3 but to just scurry to another place just seems ludicrous in my opinion. I for one can't wait to get my funds back from Tilt. But even if it were to happen tommorow I certainly wouldn't go and redeposit at cake or carbon. I'm retired until the whole thing is settled and we get "legal" sites whatever those might be. If the "smalller' sites get nabbed and more U.S. money gets seized and player start to cry, I'm going to have very little sympathy for them.


p.s.... frick THE FEDS, DOJ, OBAMA (who I voted for) and that little Aussie frick who ratted to the feds in the first place....

Sorry just had to get that off my chest again.

 Long Live Poker!
pps I never noticed the auto censor here before and imo that kinda sucks too...i love the word frick!

PokerStars US Players FAQ page

http://www.pokerstars.com/usaplayers/faq/

Now this is not Tilt, of course, but I'm thinking something similar will be going on. I will be surprised if the players funds aren't returned in a relatively timely fashion.

Of course, I've been surprised before. 

For the most part and for the great majority of people, you're absolutely right.  But we can't ignore the fact that there are a significant amount of people (some of whom we know from our forum travels) who relied on this as income.  The threat of future legal action isn't enough to just up and quit on your current means of feeding the fam, paying the bills, etc.; particularly given the difficulty of obtaining employment in the current economy.  Granted, they perhaps should have thought about looking around, but it's hard to quit doing something you love, and it's hard to go play on a lower traffic site to make less $ when FTP and PS are just plugging away.  Sure, a lot of these guys and gals had bailout plans when the shoot got too thick, but no one had any warning of Black Friday.  The DOJ came like a thief in the night.



If they have any basis in the US, yes it would be.  Fortunately, there are plenty of sites that don't have any basis in the US, and therefore nothing the US has jurisdiction to seize.

To be honest, we give a fuck if you use profanity here, that feature is just here for a couple of particular individuals who used almost solid blocks of vulgarity in their rant posts.  As long as you use common sense, go right ahead and swear.  And if you wanna know how I can say fuck, just quote this in a post form and read it.

O.k. I'm dumb, what do you mean by basis in the U.S.? It was my impression Stars and Tilt were both out of U.S. jurisdiction in the first place. I must be misunderstanding the term here.