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Airball told PokerOrg that he became close friends with Mars in 2022, a relationship that soon turned sour. “I was unlucky to meet and get to know Mars around the middle of 2022,” he said. “He was like an older brother to me. Almost. You know, we would go to dinners, we would go to Vegas, he would take me to really good private games, when I played Berkey heads up, he had a piece.
“When I played the Million Dollar Game, he took a piece. You know he wanted these pieces to support me and I would always give it to him. We were friends; I would buy pieces of him when he would play the Hustler high stakes and one week, he lost $700,000 in a session.
“I had a big piece of him, and you know we were close. We would do transactions between us that were the cost of a house, $500,000, $600,000, no problem. We developed a very intimate trust because of that. And that was kind of the beginning of me trusting Mars blindly.
“Then, you know, Mars late last year started telling me about these amazing Chinese games and he wanted to take me to them. And so he did, and it started with some games I believe a couple of times in Yorba Linda. But most of the games at the time were Irvine and these are the games that Ben was cheated in as well.
“I can’t remember super clearly but I remember that Mars was usually in Seat 9 and, in hindsight, I believe they were using the barcode cheating method. I believe they had the RFID thing set up and he (the dealer) knew what hands would win.
“But you know, I lost about $600,000 in Irvine and I paid every cent of it, obviously, and I actually played six sessions. I won $50,000 in my very last session and I was never paid.
“I personally believe Mars, the host of that game (Qiliang Sun), and another player (Mr. Fo) were the three cheaters. Then in Yorba Linda, a very similar story. I played there, you know, and Mars took over that game in March. I supported him a lot. I lost, I think, like close to half a million in Yorba Linda.
And you know, I ran aces into his kings when I was deep-stacked, and I ran kings into his aces. In Yorba Linda [you] can only run it once. And every time I would have the better hand, he would bink the set. I just never won.
“I was so suspicious. I started taking pictures of the dealers, which is why we have those pictures because I was so suspicious. And I remember I used to text Eshaan and say, ‘There might be cheating,’ and he would say, ‘Come on dude, it’s your best friend Mars. Like, relax.’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, you’re right.’
“In hindsight, obviously, they cheated. And I think the mechanic dealer was the primary way of cheating. They also used the [UV], I think, once Peter and Bruce left (as part of the ring). So I think the Mechanic and Peter and Bruce were like a team. They joined Mars, and they cheated the Yorba game. Then, they were, they were like gone from L.A. Mars realized he could just keep winning a lot from the game, so he started using these special contact-lens decks and continued to cheat.
“And you know, it’s heartbreaking. It’s hurtful. It’s, you know, personally hurtful, financially hurtful. And I’m very upset by what happened, and I hope there’s some karma in this world.”
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