I concluded that he was a jerk based on an interview he did where he came across very badly in my opinion. You would think a Hollywood agent would have access to some top notch PR folks, but apparently he doesn’t. Or he isn’t listening to them.
You will remember that I mentioned that he was rumored to owe 50% of his win to Bruce Leyser in exchange for Mr. Leyser finding some “celebrities” to represent Bodog at the WSOP. Now it appears that he doesn’t intend to pay what he owes. The Las Vegas Sun reported that Leyser has filed suit in a Las Vegas courtroom to get $6 million. One would assume that he wouldn’t go the lawsuit route unless he had a pretty good indication he wasn’t going to get the money he was owed. The lawyer is not going to work for free. I was able to find the case on the docket in the court, so it is clearly an accurate report. I haven’t been able to get my hands on the actual complaint, but it looks like all the rumors were pretty accurate.
The juicy bits from the newpaper story are quotes from an answering machine message Gold left for Leyser:
“I promise you – you can keep this recording on my word – there’s no possible way you’re not going to get half ¦ after taxes,” Leyser claims that Gold said in the telephone message. “So please just be with me. I can’t imagine you’re going to have a problem with it. I just don’t want any stress about any money or any of that (expletive) going on today, or even after the end of the day.”
Later in the recording, Gold allegedly said: “But please just trust me. You’ve trusted me the whole way, you can trust me a little bit more. I promise you there’s no way anybody will go anywhere with your money. It’s your money.”
Gold also said on the recording that he would be setting up a Nevada-based corporation that would pay Leyser his portion of the winnings, according to the complaint. “I can’t just pay out personally because I could get nailed,” Gold allegedly said.
The last bit is interesting. How would he get nailed? That is an interesting thing to say. Gold has not yet filed an answer, so we don’t know his side of the story. Apparently he hasn’t actually collected from Harrah’s because Leyser is looking for a restraining order blocking Gold from cashing out the disputed $6 million.
It is also a bit odd that a high-flying agent couldn’t find any C list celebs who would play the Main Event for free! The guys that Leyser found weren’t exactly Matt Damon star types. Stay tuned. This will probably offer even more drama before it is all over.
