In the wake of the Absolute Poker and UltimateBet scandals it can be easy to forget that for a little while the biggest cheating scandal in online poker was the 2007 World Championship of Online Poker. That saga has finally come to a close with Natalie “The V0id” Teltscher dropping her Isle of Man lawsuit against PokerStars. In addition to her withdrawn lawsuit, Natalie has also agreed to pay for some of PokerStars’ legal fees.
PokerStars hosts the annual WCOOP and the 2007 Main Event ended in a $1.3+ million USD payday for first place winner, TheV0id. Grumblings quickly surfaced that the relatively unknown first place winner had to have cheated in some way to beat top pros like Josh Arieh, who was at the 2007 WCOOP main event final table. PokerStars investigated and subsequently disqualified TheV0id citing mysterious “breaches of PokerStars terms and conditions agreements.”
A little bit of forum driven snooping unmasked TheV0id as Natalie Teltscher, sister to renowned poker pro, Mark Teltscher. Just as soon as her identity was revealed, speculation that it had in fact been Mark – rather than his sister Natalie – who had played on TheV0id account during the 2007 WCOOP began. Should Mark have in fact been in control of TheV0id during the 2007 WCOOP, then Natalie would have been in breach of the PokerStars Terms and Conditions agreement.
Flying in the face of her detractors, Natalie Teltscher initiated legal proceedings against PokerStars in the Isle of Man (where PokerStars is based) claiming wrongful accusations of fraudulence and demanding that she be reimbursed the $1.3 million USD prize confiscated by PokerStars.
But without so much as a whimper, as of August 13th, 2008 Teltscher has withdrawn her lawsuit and according to PokerStars, “she has agreed to contribute a sum towards the legal costs incurred by PokerStars in this matter.”
The rest of the statement by PokerStars reads as follows: “Teltscher initially claimed that she had played the account. However, when faced with the results from PokerStars’ investigation she eventually admitted she hadn’t played.”
While no official word about who actually played on the account has surfaced, rampant speculation of Mark’s involvement is almost sure to turn into popularly accepted fact.
Most pleased with this announcement is second-place finisher ka$ino, who will finally be able pocket the $1,378,330.50 first prize for a more than $600,000 improvement on his previous $700,782.50 prize.
This news comes at a perfect time for PokerStars as it prepares to launch the 2008 WCOOP on September 5. With the specter of TheV0id officially expunged from the PokerStars record, expect an even greater turnout for the $30,000,000 guaranteed prize pool tournament, generally considered to be the biggest online poker tournament.
