ShareDoug Polk has claimed he was threatened with legal action by Bryn Kenney shortly before his podcast with Martin Zamani, the pro who has accused Kenney of multiple instances of cheating and mistreating fellow players...
BREAKING**** Bryn Kenny has threatened me with legal action by his attorneys if misinformation is spread and it negatively effects him.
— Doug Polk (@DougPolkVids) April 21, 2022
Podcast goes live in 10 as scheduled.
Polk’s podcast did indeed go ahead, the Upswing Poker boss digging deeply into Zamani’s claims, which include allegations of ghosting, collusion, multi-accounting, as well forcing players to see shamans who tried to conduct frog poison rituals.
The incredible claims follow a week in which several top-flight highstakes players have been accused of cheating, with Ali Imsirovic and Jake Schindler chief among them.
Kenney, it seems, was half-outed a year ago by commentator and pro, Henry Kilbane, although the claims didn’t achieve much traction, perhaps because of similar legal threats to those aimed at Polk...
Who steals money from people to play?
— Henry (@henry_kilbane) April 6, 2021
Who abuses their "ambassador" role and steals players from other agents for rakeback profits?
Who's the only "Ambassador" to be dropped by GG?
Kenney, the current live tournament all-time leading moneywinner with more than $57million to his name, responded: “Steals money? Steals players? Haha ur thinking of the wrong person, don’t know what info u think u know but I was not dropped i quit and if u spread more wrong info about me like this imagine u will hear from my lawyers. Cuz ur just spreading lies.”
However, Zamani – a former horse in Kenney’s poker stable – claimed he had “nothing left to lose” when he went public this week with some of the most remarkable accusations ever seen in the poker world, and Polk was quick to question him on the details.
Lauren Roberts “screwed over” by Kenney
Among the claims of collusion and ghosting forced upon Kenney’s “horses”, perhaps the biggest story to emerge was that of Lauren Roberts, one of the relatively few highstakes female players.
Zamani had previously tweeted that “a good friend of BK a very close friend who BK stayed with and threw parties at their house and they treated Bryn like his son. What did BK do? Made his horses play when his fish friend was playing. Poached them well.”
In the Polk podcast, he revealed that player to be Lauren Roberts, stating: “Anyone who was around Lauren and Bryn knows how insanely bad he took advantage of her,” claims Zamani.
Roberts was playing on an account under the name “He22”, staked by Kenney, who Zamani claims was also forcing his other horses to play whenever Roberts – described as a “fish” – was in a game.
Zamani also says that Kenney would sometimes play on Roberts “He22” account, adding multi-accounting to the list of alleged offences.
“Holy shit. Wow!” exclaimed Polk on hearing this. “So he was multi-accounting on Lauren’s account, while screwing over Lauren in these games...”
That alleged behaviour didn’t go down well at all with poker Twitter...
The cheating is terrible but what makes Bryn Kenney look the worst IMO is the truly sociopathic behavior of pretending to be bestfriends with someone meanwhile ur actually exploiting them & sucking every dollar you can off them and sending your stable to CRUSH your so called BFF.
— 🆒 Snoopdoug 🆒 (@PuntingStacks) April 22, 2022
Shamans, Frog Poison and Acid in the Eyes
Aside from the purely poker aspects of Zamani’s whistleblowing on Kenney, the most remarkable allegations centre around Kenney sending him to a shaman.Zamani had the almost unbelievable details out, stating: “Her name is MCarol (lol) look up Kambo ritual. She blisters u with a hot stick. Cuts it with a. Knife and rubs frog poison on it. And if I didn’t want to do that I had to drop acid in my eyes Which would “ burn for hours and be hard to see” LOL.”
He revealed more details of the almost unbelievable encounter to Polk: "We talk about stuff and she goes, 'I think you need to cleanse yourself. We're gonna do the Kambo, it's called Kambo.”
Describing it as a cleansing ritual and “a little violent”, the shaman’s plans were outlined by Zamani. “She takes incense to your skin and it blisters up. She then cuts off the blister with a knife so your pores are open and then she takes the poison from the frog and puts it on you... into your open wound."
Zamani says he avoided that particular ritual, although he was then told he would have acid (LSD) placed in his eyes, something he also escaped.
In what is truly one of the most incredible and disturbing interviews the poker world has witnessed, the allegations against Kenney go far beyond simple cheating or scamming.
You can check out the entire interview below and decide for yourself.
$2M a week in rakeback payments? Reading screen when logged into poker software? This cheating scandal has rocked the poker world. https://t.co/cCakZmZc4s
— PokerTube (@pokertube) April 22, 2022
