In the few days leading up to the publication of the website, Russell claimed that he had been contacted by a Chinese man with powerful connections, including to Wesley’s bosses. This man apparently also had a grudge against Wesley because of their own internal politics.

Russell said he was terrified of going to the meeting alone, and so I offered to call the police if I didn’t hear from him in 24 hours.

Following this meeting, he said the Chinese man showed him physical evidence that Wesley had committed immigration fraud, by way of entering into a sham marriage to obtain a green card. This man wanted to sell this evidence for £80,000. Russell tried to make the case to me that this could be the nail in the coffin that would finally bring Wesley to justice. However, he pressed me too hard, and I declined.

Let me be clear. At this point, I personally wanted Wesley to be brought down. I believed he was a a terrible person who presented a threat to our broader poker community, and who had hidden his ties to organized crime. However, it was one thing to send this guy $2,500, and something else altogether to send him the £55,000 ($68,750) that he was asking for.

In the next batch of screenshots below, some names are redacted. This is not because I have anything to hide. But rather, because Russell named some real people who have nothing to do with this. He fraudulently claimed that they were involved; they were not. However, there is no doubt that Russell’s use of real people’s names made me more convinced that he was telling the truth.