On Jan. 5, in a forum thread about an upcoming game featuring Torqued, a team comprised primarily by former iBUYPOWER players, a former girlfriend of one of the players posted a series of incriminating text messages. Sent to her by her former boyfriend, Torqued player Derek \u201cdboorn\u201d Boorn, these texts gave away new details surrounding the iBUYPOWER and Netcodes match and Boorn’s apparent involvement in a match-fixing ring.<\/p>
In the texts, Boorn confirms that the game was fixed and that he had been instructed to bet for the team on alternate accounts. \u201cAll that drama about IBP,” Boorn says in one message, “they really did throw that match and I bet for them on alternate accounts.\u201d<\/p>
\u201cThey intentionally lost a match this past week,\u201d he adds, before specifically naming Sam \u201cDazed\u201d Marine, the iBUYPOWER captain at the time. \u201cI even told Dazed while they were playing to make it close and it was too obvious.\u201d<\/p>
After the text messages were released on ESEA, they quickly spread to Reddit, where they were largely denounced as fake. At that point Ashley \u201cBlacklotus\u201d Leboeuf, the ex-girlfriend, contacted the Daily Dot to bring attention to the texts. Working closely with Leboeuf, we were able to confirm the authenticity of the texts and that they were sent two days after the game in question from a phone that belongs to Derek Boorn.<\/p>
In a statement to the Daily Dot, Boorn did not deny he sent the messages, saying only that he had “zero interest in participating in any type of revenge mission she has going.\u201d<\/p>
But Leboeuf, a longstanding member of the community herself, said her motivations had nothing to do with revenge. \u201cIt really pains me to do something like this to someone I care about,\u201d she explained. \u201cBut I can\u2019t stand that the community respects these players when they do things like this. Amateur players look up to them, and they just use that to get away with anything they want.\u201d<\/p>
Betting patterns around the game back up Boorn’s statements in the text messages. Before the messages were released, there was no way to link the players to the gambling, since we had no idea who placed the bets on the team\u2019s behalf. But in Boorn\u2019s texts, he reveals the name of the individual who allegedly placed the bet, a player known as \u201ccud.\u201d<\/p>
