Months ago we ran a story highlighting the shady practices of one Pitbull Poker.  They burst onto the scene, aggressively recruiting new players, offering $10 cash to anybody that would sign up for a Pitbull account.  They rocked a flash-based gaming platform that made gambling online convenient and accessible anywhere you could find internet access.  But it wasn’t long before Pitbull players wandered into the casino and took a wiff of something stinky.  Allegations of programmed bots sitting in at tables and superusers, capable of seeing other players’ hole cards were becoming more and more prevalant.  Pitbull refused to provide information on hand histories and before you knew it, Dimensus Ltd, the parent company of Pitbull Poker had dissolved with no clear owner or even base operations.  Pitbull claimed to be a Costa Rica-based online casino, but had also mis-represented themselves as being located in the UK.  They shut their doors, showing no intention of paying players what they were owed.

Now it seems that this dog has been put to sleep and the owners of Pitbull Poker have been arrested.  Proving that if it walks like a pitbull, barks like a pitbull and bites like a pitbull…it’s probably a shady online gambling organization.

The Pitbull Poker boss arrests occurred when night shift employees were told to leave so maintanance could be conducted on the building.  The strange and sudden maintanance set off a red flag to the employees who stuck around to see what was happening.  When they spotted a truck arrive and proceed to remove all of the equipment from the office, they knew something was up and alerted the police.  The owners were arrested by Costa Rican police and are currently being held as the employees  try to convince authorities that the owners are indeed a flight risk.

I don’t want to hurt the feelings of the many loving pit bull owners out there, but from a media stereotype perspective, pit bulls are surrounded by the stigma of being owned and “appreciated” by some pretty rough characters. So, unless the site’s name is a reference to dogs playing poker, when it comes to steering clear of online poker sites, you don’t have to tell me twice to stay away from Pitbull online poker.

Pitbull aggressively sought to bring in customers by offering an unprecedented $10 to anybody who would sign up for an Pitbull poker account! Their flash-based gaming platform made gambling online with Pitbull convenient since players don’t have to download software and can play anywhere they can find an internet connection. But that’s about the only two good things I’ve heard about them.

Allegations are circulating like water in a flushing toilet bowl that Pitbull poker is up to no good. Suspicions have arisen from players that the site uses programmed bots sitting in at tables and the presence of superusers, able to see other players’ hole cards.

Player requests for hand histories, a common practice available on any trustworthy site, have been continually refused. As of July 24, 2009, hand histories are not available online. Dimensus Ltd, the parent company of Pitbull Poker has been dissolved as of March 10,2009 with no clear owner and never appears to have held a gaming license. Though they claimed they were based in Costa Rica, Pitbull had falsely represented themselves as a UK based online gaming company in the past.

As if that weren’t enough to make players who like money steer clear in favor of more reputable online casinos, one irate customer researched the folks at Pitbull and found out some pretty shady stuff. In March of 2004, Harrahs took legal action against Federico Schiavio for registering the domain wsop.com to launch his own online poker site. A scam artist named Kevin Baronowsky, who registered several domains selling things like pheromones and steroid cream, which redirect to Pitbull poker, was linked to forums that discuss illegally accessing satellite television. Later, he was arrested by a government agency for selling illegal equipment and ratted out his customers.

Since these accusations have come to light, more and more former online customers of Pitbull poker have come forward with accounts of seeing questionable happenings at their tables.