Legal Dispute Continues Between Clonie Gowen And Full Tilt Poker

Published on 2009-02-04 03:38:30

Was Clonie Gowen stiffed out of her rightful 1% stake in Full Tilt Poker and all of its associated companies?

The increasingly nasty legal dispute between Gowen and FTP got even uglier last week when Clonie Gowen and her team of lawyers filed an amended complaint against Full Tilt Poker.

Gowen laid out her case against FTP (and its related companies) in a 33 page document that is now available online.

There are now a total of 20 defendants (including companies such as Tiltware LLC, Pocket Kings Consulting and Tiltproof, Inc., and individual defendants such as Mike Matusow, Phil Ivey and Gus Hansen) and 12 claims (including breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty and fraud).

For those who aren't sure exactly what is going on, here is a brief recap:

Gowen has sued Full Tilt Poker (and its related companies) and the principals of the company for $40 million dollars, alleging that she was promised a 1% stake in FTP (and all of its satellite companies) in exchange for doing promotional work for the site.

She claims that she was offered (and accepted) the 1% stake in the company in 2004. When other players started receiving distribution payments, she reportedly demanded her share and was rejected. Gowen alleges that the company tried to give her a six-figure payout in exchange for the time that she spent promoting the company, but she rejected it. She filed the lawsuit shortly after hearing that Full Tilt would be soon releasing a press release, stating that she was no longer a part of the company.

She pins the value of Full Tilt Poker at $4 billion dollars. This is where the $40 million dollar figure comes from (1% of four billion dollars).

Gowen asserts that the defendants committed "oppressive, fraudulent and malicious" acts against her.

Clonie and her lawyers have asked the Court to order Full Tilt (and its associated companies) to "prepare a true and accurate accounting of all of the activities and assets of the Companies in order to determine all amounts justly due to the Plaintiff with respect to Plaintiff's unpaid 1% ownership interest in the Companies".

Can this case actually continue without being settled?

I don't think that the people behind Full Tilt Poker really want to crack open the books and allow their ownership/company structure to be exposed to the public. I'm sure that Gowen and her lawyers know this.

I'm not taking sides in this case, but I'll ask the question: if you don't believe that Gowen was promised 1% in the company and is making this up, then what was her arrangement? Her face was plastered all over the site not that long ago. She was listed as a member of "Team Full Tilt" for ages on the Full Tilt Poker web site (here is a 2004 page from Archive.org in which she is listed as a member of "Team Full Tilt Poker"). She appeared on Poker After Dark wearing FTP gear. She appeared at many different tournaments wearing FTP gear. If she wasn't promised 1% of the company, then what was she promised?

It will be interesting to see how far this goes.

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Filed Under: Random Poker News