Bad Beat: Poker Player Has to Repay First Place Winnings Six Months Later

August 17th, 2018 | by Jason Reynolds

Credit Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs with the slow roll of the year so far. The British tax authority told Adam Lulat that he must repay all £68,930 ($95,404) he took home after winning the Main Event of the second leg of the 2018 Grosvenor UK Poker Tour in Manchester.

Adam Lulat won the 2018 GUKPT Main Event in Manchester earlier this year, but was ordered to repay all of it and then some to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. (Photo: GUKPT)

Lulat won the tournament in March but was dealt the bad beat earlier in August – nearly six months later.

In 2015, Lulat was sentenced to 28 months in prison for his involvement in a money laundering scheme that took in £40 million ($51.2 million) between September 2010 and November 2011. Authorities say he benefitted to the tune of over £237,000.

Lulat didn’t have the assets to pay back the sum at the time, but the fines against him remain and HMRC is entitled to that entire amount. They didn’t even leave him another buy-in – along with the £68,930 the tax collectors also seized £2,840 he had in a separate bank account.

Two Adam Lulats?

Multiple reports state that Lulat began his 28-month prison sentence in September 2015. Oddly, Lulat’s Hendon Mob page shows two tournament cashes during that period.

Records show he placed 15th at the £200+20 Mini Main Event of the eighth leg of the GUKPT in Blackpool in November 2016; as well as 19th in the Unibet UK Poker Tour in Manchester in December 2016.

Nice while it lasted

In Manchester, Lulat beat a field of 241 entrants in the £1,000 +110 Main Event that lasted from March 1-4. He flopped a set of nines with the cheap lead during heads up play and his opponent, Gary Whitehead, flopped middle pair. Whitehead went all-in on the turn and Lulat snap called for the title.

“I enjoyed all three days,” he said. “It was tough.”

“I think I lost a bit of focus and then had to change gear really. Just change strategy and it worked out,” he said after winning.

British authorities had nearly six months to prepare their response. Debbie Porter, Assistant Director of Fraud Investigations for HMRC, said in a statement, “Lulat thought he’d aced the tournament but we had the better hand in the end.”