Todd Witteles, a defendant in Mike Postle's defamation lawsuit, says Postle's attorney has filed a motion to withdraw as counsel.
Postle, a professional poker player in Northern California, was accused by Veronica Brill in 2019 of cheating during Stones Live streams. He allegedly used some sort of electronic device to view his opponent's hole cards.
Via attorney Mac VerStandig, Brill and 87 other plaintiffs filed a $10 million lawsuit last year against Postle. But the outcome wasn't favorable for the plaintiffs, who walked away with essentially pennies.
In response to the repeated attacks from Brill, poker podcaster Joey Ingram, and others, Postle fired back with his own $330 million lawsuit, which is currently working its way through the California civil courts. He's suing for defamation of character as he claims the poker media and Brill ruined his life by spreading what he says are repeated falsehoods. The accused scam artist hired Steven T. Lowe of Lowe & Associates to represent him in court.
However, according to Todd Witteles, one of the defendants, Lowe wants off the case. The "Poker Fraud Alert" podcast host also known in the poker world as "Dan Druff" said the plaintiff's attorney filed a motion to be relieved of his duty.
Witteles brought his attorney, Eric Bensamochan, on to his podcast Wednesday to discuss the situation. The lawyer said he was notified that Postle's attorney no longer wants to represent the accused poker cheater in court.
Postle also, according to the document provided to Bensamochan, hasn't been holding up his end of the bargain. What that likely means, the lawyer said, is that Postle hasn't been paying his legal fees.
Mike Postle could still face legal trouble
The civil suit is set for trial in February in a Sacramento court. Witteles believes the lawsuit is "frivolous" and is confident he will win. But he isn't too thrilled with having to go through the whole legal process to defend himself against a frivolous lawsuit.
If Witteles wins the case, or it never ends up reaching trial, his attorney is ready to put the hammer down on Postle.
"We will automatically win attorneys fees if our motion prevails in February," Witteles told Poker.org. "Then we will relentlessly collect."
What that means is if the case is dropped or he wins, Witteles isn't just going to pay his lawyers their fees and pay off any other court costs and then move on with his life. He's going to do everything in his power to ensure that Postle is forced to pay those fees.
There are a handful of pro-Postle accounts on Twitter that often harass those who accuse Postle of cheating. Witteles and others believe the accounts are run by Stones Gambling Hall tournament director Justin Kuraitis and/or Postle himself.
For some odd reason, those accounts (@pokerheroes1, @poker_thug, and Kuraitis, aka "JFKPokerTD") have all gone M.I.A. from Twitter the past two months.
The reason for their mysterious disappearance is unknown. Perhaps they're fed up with defending Postle. Or maybe Postle's attorneys told them to quit posting. Witteles, who believes Kuraitis is behind at least one of the accounts, has a different theory.
"I suspect those accounts may have been on someone's payroll," he said. "But whatever. I'll deal with them later."
Featured image source: Twitter
