Poker Fraud Alert Is Scam Artists’ Paradise
Poker Fraud Alert forum has been going downhill since its inception one year ago. What happened and why is this poker forum failing?
First let’s look at the PFA website stats from Alexa.com:
Percentage of global visits to PFA that arrived from a search engine: Down 26% in past month.
Percentage of global pageviews on PFA: Down 18% in past month.
Daily time spent on PFA: Down 18% in past month.
Percentage of global internet users who visit PFA: Down 14% in the past three months.
Table of Contents
Check Out Interesting Poker Fraud Alert UPDATES after article
I could go on and on about how every indicator reveals that Poker Fraud Alert is floundering and fizzling. The stats don’t lie.
Ironically the only significant bump in traffic on PFA during the past year was directly caused by me, Six Toed Pete. That occurred in January and February of this year after I was the first to report about Poker Fraud Alert forum member John Sepulveda‘s (aka Jasep, aka JohnnySep) criminal history, scams and frauds.
It turned out the owner of Poker Fraud Alert, Todd Witteles (aka Dan Druff) was a good forum friend and part-time podcast co-host with John Sepulveda. JohnnySep was one of Todd’s most popular PFA members. In fact Witteles vouched for, promoted and supported every scam and fraud Jasep created on Poker Fraud Alert. If Todd had done some “fraud alert” research on Jasep he could have avoided that embarrassment. Plus Todd could have stopped Jasep’s frauds before so much money was stolen. He would have been a hero.
Initially, Witteles and Sepulveda (who owned his own poker forum called Vegas Poker Radio) joined forces and ganged up on me for spreading “lies” about Todd’s Golden Boy Jasep. They and their minions used their respective poker forums to attack me and my credibility. These poker forum owners and members used doctored photos of me, my home, my family, my copyrighted materials and more. Much of my private, personal and work information was revealed often with vile, disgusting twists and lies. Sepulveda even made a false police report about me which backfired with grave consequences for him.
Karma Catches Up With Jasep And Todd Witteles
I didn’t back down. Their lies and bullying didn’t work. I shut down Vegas Poker Radio forum, exposed all of John Sepulveda’s frauds and scams so that he eventually admitted everything I wrote was true, including his theft of thousands of dollars from the children’s charity 22@ Foundation. He’s either on the run or hiding out from the criminal investigation his misdeeds caused.
Click For Jasep and Todd Witteles 2014 UPDATE
Todd Witteles became a laughingstock in the poker community. He spent January and February on PFA trying to cover his ass and separate himself from Jasep. To hear Todd these days one would think he never knew the guy. However, irreparable damage was already done to Todd Witteles’ reputation as the “Fraud Alert King”.
The owner of Poker Fraud Alert had one of the most notorious poker fraudsters right under his nose, a man with a felony criminal record for fraud and Todd, the poker fraud expert, couldn’t sniff him out! Plus sometimes Todd co-hosted poker radio with him while vouching for and promoting every scam Jasep ran on PFA without doing any due diligence!
So that’s how I increased traffic on Poker Fraud Alert in January and February. Unfortunately for PFA, my boost didn’t last. So let’s look closer at why Poker Fraud Alert forum is failing.
The founder, Todd Witteles has a history with failed or failing poker forums. He’s just not very good at running a successful poker forum. Every poker forum Todd has owned, moderated, had a leading role in or association with has failed.
NeverwinPoker failed. As Dan Michalski wrote in Pokerati.com:
“…the filthiest, most offensive poker site on the internet — filled with racist, sexist, drug-addled degeneracy and perverse nudity that provided a voice for a notably vile, socially maladjusted segment of the poker world — is no longer…”
That website address now goes to Dustin Woolf’s homepage. It hasn’t been updated in years and has no poker forum. It’s dead.
Todd then became part owner in DownDown.com, another NSFW website/poker forum. Witteles wanted to own a website that published pornography and continued NWP’s style of racism, sexism, gossip and perversion. That poker forum now goes to something called DonkDown 3.0. There is no poker forum there but when the forum was up last month, there was literally zero traffic. If not dead, it’s hardly breathing.
Witteles then changed hats from “Poker Porn King” to “Poker Fraud Alert King” as owner of Poker Fraud Alert. It’s not going well for Dan Druff.
Todd Witteles Claims He Will Clean Up The Poker Community
Let’s review pertinent parts of Todd’s mission statement for PFA. It reveals exactly why PFA is failing. The highlighted sections in bold were made by me.
“Welcome to PokerFraudAlert!
by Dan Druff Published on 03-03-2012 01:55 AM
Welcome to PokerFraudAlert!
Why did I start this site? Because I love the game of poker. And because I hate what the scumbags and criminals are doing to it.
Prior to the “boom” of 2003, the poker community was small and close-knit. Cheating was localized to a few people engaging in collusion or other small-time scams. Times have changed. Poker has become big business, and the massive amount of money involved has attracted many bottom-feeders of our society.
Fortunately, we have the internet as the people’s weapon to shine the light upon those engaging in theft from our community. Unfortunately, up until now, there was no single, organized place to list and discuss these scandals. While the 2+2 forums have a large following and have been instrumental in breaking open various scandals, they are far from ideal. Accusations against their sponsors have often been censored. Even when discussion has been fully allowed, the site is so huge that it’s hard to find these scam warning threads, and most people never see them.
PokerFraudAlert seeks to be the one-stop place on the web to learn all about the shady companies, individuals, and situations in poker. We can’t do this alone. We will need your help to be the eyes and ears of our community, and to report whatever you see on our forum. We will never censor your claims, even if they’re against one of our sponsors. In addition to providing you an open forum report fraud within the poker community, we will also analyze your claims with a clear head an unbiased point of view. And, of course, the accused will always have the floor to defend themselves.
We’ve been open since March, 2012, and the site is thriving! Check out our forum, and don’t miss our weekly radio show! Join the community and tell us what’s on your mind!”
Stats reveal that the site is not thriving and here’s why. Todd Witteles is dishonest. He doesn’t follow his own PFA rules and TOS. He does censor opposing views. His rules prohibit publication of personal, private and work photos and information but he allowed my data to be plastered all over his forum. When I objected, he censored me. He tried to protect his forum friend John Sepulveda by silencing me. It didn’t work.
Protecting con men, scam artists and frauds like John Sepulveda is precisely why Poker Fraud Alert is failing. Although I’m banned there I visit PFA any time I wish. I have multiple sources on Poker Fraud Alert. Some are active members in good standing while others are dupe accounts. My “Dupe Squad” and sources were helpful in researching this article. If Todd bans one dupe IP, someone just opens another one. For a guy who brags about a computer science degree, Todd is not very intelligent. He doesn’t know how to effectively block IPs.
Todd’s mission statement mentions scumbags and criminals, collusion, scams and bottom-feeders of our society. My research reveals that the PFA membership is chock-full of exactly those types of reprobates and behavior!
Poker Fraud Alert Makes Poker Community Worse
We already know about PFA member John Sepulveda (btw, while I am banned “Jasep” is still a member of PFA! Todd won’t ban his forum friend and former podcast co-host) and his theft from the community but let’s check out the other PFA members.
The mission statement mentions cheating and collusion. PFA member and fervent supporter of Jasep, “WillieMcFML” has admitted engaging in poker game collusion and chip dumping with another PFA member “Yebsite”. “Yebsite” has committed identity theft fraud (one of Jasep’s many crimes) and boasts of stealing from poker sites. “WillieMcFML” ‘s friend and also a PFA member, “JustifiedHomicide” has scammed victims for over five figures.
“JustifiedHomicide” still hasn’t repaid his many victims in the poker community yet incredibly, Todd Witteles has discussed offering him his own radio show on PFA! All the while Todd warns us about the bottom-feeders of our society. Let’s meet some other members of Poker Fraud Alert.
Let me introduce female PFA member “Vwls” (aka “FckVwls” aka “RealFckVwls”). This “lady” stole @ $13,000 from Todd’s friend ICFishies. She is currently (although on hiatus) Todd’s official co-host for his weekly poker podcast.
Another PFA member in good standing is “PLOL”. He stole @ $1,200 from PokerStars. Todd not only didn’t ban “PLOL”, he praised him for his brilliant theft.
PFA forum favorite “badguy23″ has often bragged about stealing from sportsbooks and poker sites. Todd even allows him to publish his scam methods so other Poker Fraud Alert members can steal just like “badguy23″.
Continuing on we have PFA member “408Mike” who has admitted stealing from another PFA member. Mike has not been banned. PFA member “Weissman”, who reportedly stole from “Tommyboy” and “USC”, is still a PFA member in good standing and “Templar”, another PFA scammer is still approved by Witteles.
PFA member “SrslySirius” is not a bottom-feeder. I actually think the guy has talent but he often makes poor decisions. Last night he admitted to a member of my “Dupe Squad” that he cheated and gamed YouTube in order to garner millions of views for one of his videos. He confessed to paying for fake YouTube views by utilizing a view bot software script.
Even if he claims to have changed his ways as he assured my undercover dupe last night, surely he recognizes even one video with millions of faked views gives his YouTube channel and subsequent videos a huge unfair advantage over honest YouTube broadcasters. Plus his admission of scamming YouTube puts his entire channel at risk and taints everything he does in the future.
“SrslySirius” initially joined forces with the characters at QuadJacks. That site failed. Later he hooked up with DonkDown. That site gets zero traffic. Now he has hitched his wagon to Todd Witteles and Poker Fraud Alert, a poker forum awash in disreputable scoundrels who continue to cheat, defraud and scam innocent members of the poker community all under Dan Druff’s dishonest banner, Poker Fraud Alert.
Someone should advise the kid to get as far away from PFA as possible. Take a page from Brandon “Drexel” Gerson’s book and leave.
As “Alex Thomas” commented on another article I penned about Todd Witteles and Poker Fraud Alert:
“I am writing this to assure people that what is being written here is true and not just the actions of someone with a vendetta.”
I appreciated that because Witteles and his fraud trolls tried to spread the lie that I have a vendetta against Todd. I don’t.
A Dangerous Poker Forum
Look at the facts. One PFA member stole hundreds and thousands of dollars from over forty innocent members of Poker Fraud Alert. Witteles vouched for that man, “JohnnySep”. Many of those PFA members are now former PFA members. Who can blame them for leaving Poker Fraud Alert?
What did Todd Witteles do as his poker forum members were being fleeced? He kept himself busy clipping coupons for Boston Chicken. Todd Witteles is a hypocrite, a total failure as the self-appointed Chief Of Poker Fraud Police.
Run down any of the PFA scams that continually run on Todd’s poker forum. Most of them victimize other Poker Fraud Alert members! Is it any surprise that PFA has hit rock bottom?
Good folks in the poker community don’t want to participate in a poker forum where some members breed, promote, celebrate and commit scams, frauds and crimes. That’s why Poker Fraud Alert is failing. Contrary to fighting poker fraud, Witteles’ incompetence has opened the floodgates to scam artists, thieves and other assorted miscreants.
Past honest PFA members have left and except for the “Dupe Squad”, no new members are joining PFA. What’s left is a sad, pathetic community of scam artists, cheaters and criminals, peppered by clueless lonely old fat guys like the two-legged horse’s ass, “RolloTomasi” and ignorant cut and paste whack job posters like DirtyB. Only about 15 “active” members regularly post there and the majority of those losers do so anonymously from Mom’s basement.
Even Todd Witteles senses the inevitable truth of this article. He recently implored the authorities at TwoPlusTwo poker forum to reinstate his account there. Todd had been posting for years under a dupe account. His ban was lifted so now he can post under his true handle on a poker forum folks actually read. He sees the writing on the wall. His reputation is in tatters. Stick a fork in it, PFA is done.
Interestingly Poker Fraud Alert’s symbol or avatar is the skull and crossbones…an emblem warning of danger, used to indicate the presence of toxic or poisonous material. Now that’s an appropriate logo for the scam artists’ paradise.
UPDATE: After reading this article, Todd Witteles made a huge blunder. He posted several comments on his poker forum, Poker Fraud Alert, where he threatened to pay a cyberstalking hit man $800 to harass me online! I have all the threats including screenshots.
$800 might be a small fortune to Witteles’ hit-boy who could reside in Eastern Europe…Lithonia or he could just another one of Todd’s dupes. Todd may be planning a crime with these cyberstalking threats…hopefully his lawyer will explain this to him.
UPDATE 2: Todd Witteles Portrait Of A Cyberstalker Part 1
5 Responses to Poker Fraud Alert Is Scam Artists’ Paradise
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6 thoughts on “Poker Fraud Alert Is Scam Artists’ Paradise”
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Ty Jenny!
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Ty Vince! Great comment.
Hey Pete good blog, good info you gave out regarding Todd Witteles and Poker Fraud Alert. This Todd guy seems like he might be in on the scams himself. Vouches for the scammers then claims innocence once they are caught. I’ll definitely be steering clear of this poker fraud alert site.
Thank you Micah. From my own dealings with Todd Witteles I know he is a dishonest man. He is incompetent and lacks good judgement. His approval of and association with criminals, scam artists and their various schemes certainly makes him partially responsible for the damage suffered by the many innocent victims.
nice blog, peter!!
That was a well written article and very precise. I really hope you follow up with things because Todd Witteles has been getting away with this type of harassment for far too long. He has used his site to make up malicious lies about people in the past. He does this under phony names (a common occurrence with Todd Witteles) and then links threads together to get a higher google rating. Another thing, you may want to contact the California I.R.S. and inform them that Todd Witteles claims residency in Las Vegas
to avoid paying taxes in the state of California where he spends 99% of his time.
Todd Witteles is a very sick man. I remember seeing Daniel Negreanu do an interview about the players at his table during a tournament. When asked about Todd Witteles he simply rolled his eyes and exclaimed “Oh, that guy.” He left no doubt that he thinks Todd Witteles is simply just some annoying freak of nature. There is very good reason as to why absolutely nobody that is respected in the poker world has anything decent to say about Todd Witteles. I’m sure it must sting a little that he will never sniff any lucrative sponsorship deals or jobs relating to poker since he has chosen to roll around with bottom feeders and slime.
One last thing, Todd Witteles has concealed his identity more than anyone could ever know. For whatever reason, this 40 plus year old man still makes prank phone calls and uses a phone spoofer to contact people and their acquaintances only to harass them. Bryan Micon eventually revealed that it was Todd Witteles posting under a fake name just so he could display pictures of another poker man’s penis. Bryan also said that Todd lied and withheld information in another poker scandal when they were contacted by the FBI. Remember when someone named Action Jackson showed up on Full Contact Poker to defend Todd Witteles’s reprehensible behavior at the WSOP? Well, anyone that still doesn’t believe that was Todd Witteles himself just hasn’t been paying attention. I could go on and on but time is short, maybe I’ll post more later. Keep up the good work.
Cant blame anybody for wanting to fuck over the California Franchise Tax Board. That fucking state is nothing but a leech on its residents. They fucking hand out shit to illegals right and left and then wonder why the state is the shithole bankrupt clusterfuck it is. Fuck Cali. Good for Druff if he can stick it to Moonbeam Brown and his potsmoking dipshits in Sacramento.