Professional poker player embezzled $22m to gamble on crypto

A US pro poker player has pleaded guilty to charges of embezzling more than $22 million from his employer and then using the stolen cash for cryptocurrency gambling.

Dennis Blieden, 30, formerly of Santa Monica and now a resident of Cincinnati, pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft.

According to his plea agreement, Blieden was the controller and vice president of accounting and finance for StyleHaul, a digital marketing company that once worked with top influencers including Zoella and Joe Sugg.

Blieden had control over the company’s bank accounts and abused this authority to wire company money to his personal bank account, the document states.

Blieden then used the stolen money to pay for personal expenses and to fund his cryptocurrency accounts.

The money he stole from his employer was used to write $1,204,000 in personal checks to poker players, $1,134,956 was used to pay off his credit cards, and $8,473,734 was transferred to Blieden’s cryptocurrency accounts, according to court documents.

To hide his crime, Blieden made fraudulent entries in StyleHaul’s accounting records, falsely representing that the illegal wire transfers he made were authorised payments to StyleHaul clients.

Blieden also disguised his fraud by creating a fictitious lease in May 2018 for the rental of a condominium in Rosarito Beach, Mexico, which bore a forged signature of a StyleHaul executive.

Blieden admitted that he illicitly transferred $230,000 of StyleHaul’s funds by falsely representing that the condominium was being rented for business purposes for the company’s clients and employees.

On February 21 and 22, shortly before his dismissal, Blieden entered into two poker tournaments wherein the buy-in amounts were $52,000 and $103,000 respectively, court papers state.

United States District Judge André Birotte Jr scheduled a March 20 sentencing hearing, at which time Blieden will face a statutory maximum sentence of 22 years in federal prison.