New Charges Filed Against Full Tilt Managers

September 13th, 2012 | 1:03 am

The US Department of Justice has filed a new civil complaint which seeks over $135 million from Ray Bitar, Howard Lederer, Chris Ferguson, and Rafe Furst.

By Matt Kaufman, Rakeback.com Poker News Editor

For months after the Full Tilt Poker scandal, poker players had their hopes set on getting their missing money back.

In late July, the poker world finally received news that PokerStars agreed to purchase Full Tilt, and in doing so all former Full Tilt customers would be able to receive their refunds. PokerStars would handle non-US refunds themselves, and the Department of Justice (DOJ) would handle refunds to US-based players.

Since then, poker players have had a new hope - that the individuals responsible for the situation would be brought to justice.

While most of the people who were directly responsible faced criminal charges on Black Friday, several managers at Full Tilt only faced civil penalties for their involvement.

Ray Bitar, Howard Lederer, Chris Ferguson, and Rafe Furst were indicted in a civil complaint in July (of the four only Bitar also faced criminal charges), and those same four are now facing new charges in a second amended civil complaint.

The government is seeking judgments of over $40 million each against Bitar, Lederer, and Ferguson as well as over $11 million from Furst.

Although they won't end up in jail, Lederer, Ferguson, and Furst can potentially lose the entirety of their assets. That may not be good enough for many mad poker players, but it would certainly be a nice alternative to them getting away with facing minimal consequences.