Players line up to charge Nick Vertucci

Additional reporting by Adam Hampton.

Nick Vertucci, the controversial co-creator/producer of the Hustler Casino Live Poker Stream is at the center of numerous allegations this week inappropriate behavior towards women. The allegations include harassment of players and employees at Hustler Casino and elsewhere, including alleged Hustler dealer Lauren lost her job after reporting Vertucci’s behavior to management.

The allegations also include an incident in which Vertucci played against a professional Kitty Kuo on the Live on the bike Stream and showed her an unsolicited intimate and inappropriate photo of yourself on his cell phone.

The story broke over the weekend when the X account of occasional HCL player and attorney Julia McBride (aka “Julia from Palmdale”) posted an open call to the poker world, stories of Vertucci’s harassment, as well as screenshots of a text conversation between the two to share.

Kitty Kuo then shared her experience with Vertucci from one appearance Live on the bike a few years ago. Post on XKuo said, “Well, it was a true story. Before Covid 19, I played LATB.” [Live at the Bike] many, many times. And this guy was absolutely right. When Nick showed me his dick pics at the poker table (live stream), I was all strong and said “You have a pencil dick”. And he was so angry. I don’t give a shit if I can’t play for HCL, but it happened to me.

Actress and poker player Arden Cho added her support for Hustler dealer Lauren — and her condemnation of Vertucci.

Cho also responded to another account on X that said, “He [Vertucci] is damn scary. I confronted him about rubbing Sashimi’s ears and wanting Arden to strip search him and then HCL blocked me lmao.”

Cho replied, “Yeah, that was the last time I played a stream with him.”

The Sashimi reference refers to an incident on a Hustler Casino live stream on February 3, 2023, which made for uncomfortable viewing at the time, but takes on greater significance in light of the allegations made against Vertucci.

In the game, the camera is located somewhere else on the table if there is one Excitement between Vertucci and Sashimi. The cameras quickly pan to the two players sitting next to each other and the exchange is recorded.

Sahsimi: Please stop.
Vertucci: Okay, don’t you like that?
Sashimi: No, no.
Vertucci: We found their weak point.
Sashimi: It’s sexual harassment.
Vertucci [points]: Oh, stop it.
Sashimi: No.
Vertucci: Are you kidding?
Sashimi: No, I’m serious.
Vertucci: By putting a bug in your ear?
Sashimi: Yes.
Vertucci: Okay, no problem. That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. It won’t happen again, I swear.

Ash Kardash, poker content creator is another player coming forward. She claimed in a Twitter Spaces conversation that Vertucci made unwanted advances toward her in 2023, which she denied.

PokerOrg also spoke to someone else High-stakes player who appeared on the Hustler Casino live stream but would like to remain anonymous for now. She said: “I think it’s unfortunate and so disappointing that someone in a position of ownership is essentially manipulating people to make them feel like they just have to do whatever he wants to play in the game.”

Julia McBride: I hope others will come forward

PokerOrg spoke with Julia McBridewhose contribution brought the topic to greater attention for the first time, providing more detail and context surrounding the story.

Thanks for the conversation, Julia. Why did you decide to release this information now?

At the time these texts were written, about a year ago, Nick asked me out a lot and I kept saying no. I didn’t think I needed to publish it at the time. I was very nice about it in the lyrics, which gets me a lot of criticism onlineinstead of saying, “Stop texting me.” I just laughed it off and said, “I have a boyfriend because I wanted to play on the Hustler stream.” I thought I had to do it Be really nice and don’t burn this bridge if possible.

I also didn’t do anything around June of this year I found out that Nick had banned me from the stream. I thought he could run his business however he wanted. I wouldn’t do anything until I found out that Lauren had been and had been molested by him lost her job as a result. At this point, it’s like people need to step forward. So it seemed like the right time, especially since, to my knowledge, Lauren wasn’t getting any support from anyone who obviously knew about a lot of the things that were going on. Instead of being able to substantiate her claim of sexual harassment, she was pushed to the side of the road. I thought, “Let’s just put these lyrics out there and let the chips fall where they may.”

What do you think about the responses you received online?

Most of the answers are positive and that makes me feel good. The only reason I’m doing this is so that other people will come forward and the truth will come out, and Nick is not in a staff leadership role or in a position to exert power over other women regarding the current issue. It’s nice to get positive feedback, but it’s hard to get criticism.

Whenever there’s a power dynamic like this and women don’t do anything at first – when we’re just trying to deflect nicely or when we’re laughing – and then we get all this resistance later on when we say, “Okay, I’ve had enough.”… Have that we all The kind of shame that the outside world also inflicts on us when we change our minds. It’s really hard. I mean, I think I should have done something different back then.

Apart from this text, were there other things that were said to you personally?

I don’t remember him being that crass in person, so I think the two screenshots I posted were probably the worst and they really aren’t painfully offensive. They’re just really creepy and spooky. But yeah, there was just the personal question of, “Would you go out with me?” and “Why not?” I don’t even know if I actually had a boyfriend at the time, but I said I did it just to get him involved to make you withdraw. He also asked if it was because he was married and what if that wasn’t a problem. I said I still didn’t feel well. And he said, “Okay.” And he always said, “Yeah, yeah, no problem, okay, okay.” And then Just do it again the next time I saw him.

Did you see Kitty Kuo post her experience with Nick?

Kitty is very open and has no fear. And it was incredible what he did. But also, you know, in the Live on the bike For days, as far as I know, he wasn’t a showrunner. He was just a guy who did that. But I love her comment: “I don’t care if I never play there again.”

Kitty Kuo claims Vertucci showed her an inappropriate “self-portrait” at the table.

What would you like to see?

I would be pretty outraged if Nick ever set foot on that stage again. Ryan has never been inappropriate with me and I have never heard him act inappropriately with anyone, I have never had a problem with Ryan. But really, The best takeaway would be that Lauren gets her job back and that Nick is nowhere near capable of managing the staff or being nearly as good. I don’t care if he still owns it and is a silent partner. It’s important that Nick doesn’t have the ability to use his power to simply do and say whatever he wants with women.

Berkey: People wanted to be in circles

One of the biggest poker stories of the week, the Vertucci affair was covered by professional players and podcasters Matt Berkey on his Just friends Podcast. Here’s some of what Berkey had to say (you can watch the entire episode here).

“This happens when you give your support in droves to people who don’t deserve it. You will receive a corrupted stream. You get a corrupt owner who is now using his power and position to alienate young attractive women, which there is no shortage of on Hustler live streams. They essentially built a brand based on that for quite some time. Max Pain Monday has almost been repackaged as an opportunity for a young hot girl… It’s exploitative.

“To a certain extent it’s easy to come with a pitchfork now, but that’s so easy when you overlook what’s happened in the last three years. The amount of people that were given so much attention.” Find a reason why this guy can’t be as bad as he’s portrayed to beand give him a boost. From the top down, it all started with selfish motives…relevance reasons, access reasons. As it trickles down, you just want to be in the circle, in the cascading effects, with something that’s trending up.”

Matt Berkey on Monday’s edition of the Only Friends podcast.

On the subject of Lauren, the fired dealer, Berkey continued: “I hope there is a lot of upward pressure for Hustler to do her justice. Maybe we haven’t heard from her because she’s pursuing litigation, I don’t know, but I hope she’s at least healthy… I only know her a little; I have played with her twice but she is absolutely one of the best dealers I have ever met.

Garrett Adelstein: Allegations don’t surprise me

Other players have also been included in the list.

PokerOrg contacted Garrett Adelsteinwho was once the most popular player on the Hustler Casino live stream. Adelstein told us, “The way Nick talked to and about women, even when the cameras were rolling, always disgusted me.”

“Unfortunately, nothing that has already come to light surprises me. And I have reason to believe that this is far from the end of the story.”

“I hope the public now better understands why I still firmly believe that Nick’s ‘unbiased investigation’ into J4 was anything but. I can only hope that the alleged victims here are treated differently than I was. Namely, instead of unsuccessfully. “By attempting to wage a multi-year smear campaign against them in order to protect HCL’s interests, they are being given the respect and dignity they deserve.”

In the meantime, popular HCL player Nik Airball has just opened up about the allegations

Doug Polk has also spoken out, saying: “In Nick Vertucci’s recent history, using a place of power to make unwanted sexual advances towards women is terrible. This doesn’t just mean being a scary guy. Anything other than removing him from the series completely is completely unacceptable.

PokerOrg Hustler contacted Casino Live before publishing this article but declined to comment.