A player who won a World Series of Poker Online event for over $1.1m has been disqualified, permanently banned, and had his winnings denied. [Image: Shutterstock.com]

$1m champion disqualified

The first-place finisher of a $25k World Series of Poker Online high roller event has been disqualified from the event and permanently banned by GGPoker.

The user, “forzaitalia,” prevailed over a final table in September featuring illustrious names such as Adrian Mateos, Bryn Kenney, and Chris Brewer, defeating the latter heads up for a bracelet and the $1,122,201 top prize.

players were contacted by GGPoker informing them that the player had been disqualified

However, this week, players were contacted by GGPoker informing them that the player had been disqualified and permanently banned, and that his prize money would be redistributed among the other players.

Bracelet not awarded

The identity of the user was a mystery to the other players at the table; the account had just $36k in cashes on GGPoker before playing the event.

Players believed the account belonged to someone named Francesco Garofalo and quickly began to speculate on the precise reason for the decision to disqualify the player.

Multi-accounting, playing on more than one account in the tournament, was chief among the suspicions, although the use of real-time assistance or other tools also remains a possibility. So far, GGPoker has not clarified the reason for its decision.

I got the difference between 2nd to 1st. But I don’t get the bracelet”

It also appears that Brewer will not be receiving the bracelet in addition to his share of the winnings. Posting on X, Brewer said: “I got the difference between 2nd to 1st. But I don’t get the bracelet, quite happy either way.”

Third biggest refund

The refund will go down as the third biggest in online poker history. The largest, which occurred during the poker boom era, saw the then-biggest online prize of all time of $1.37m denied to the winner of the 2007 PokerStars WCOOP Main Event.

The account was registered to Natalie Teltscher, sister of pro player Mark Teltscher. Natalie would attempt to retrieve her winnings through the courts, but the case was dropped after she confessed to not playing the event herself.

Meanwhile, in second place, Dutch player “wann2play,” who also won the WCOOP Main Event in 2018 for $1.35m, was disqualified, again for multi-accounting.