Randy Pitchford being sued for embezzlement and other weird stuff

Story comes from Jason Shreirer thought i would post this on the forums, this story is all kinds of crazzy. (Especially the USB part).

Story

this quote is definitely fuck'd up

"Callender had also accused Pitchford of holding parties in which “adult men have reportedly exposed themselves to minors, to the amusement of Randy Pitchford.”

I'll be interested to see all this play out but first blush this all feels like a whole lot of bullshit.

David Eddings (former vice president at Gearbox, and the voice of Claptrap) twitted this 20 hours ago:

https://twitter.com/davideddings/status/1083827429704118273

This sounds like it will be a huge mess. My hot take is that the truth is probably somewhere in the middle, and they are both guilty to some degree. Hopefully, the most disgusting stuff turns out to be untrue.

Hang on...so based on what Callender and Eddings have said, if they both claim that these things are true, that would mean that they knew about the adult men exposing themselves to minors and didn't report anything until it was filed in a public lawsuit? Because that's pretty fucking terrible, too.

Yeah either someone is lying about these horrible alleged incidents for personal gain or someone covered for horrible alleged incidents for personal gain.

That bit from Eddings muddies it even more since he obviously can't just clarify what exactly he's talking about.

What a mess this will be.

People around him knowing about it but not directly doing anything is a very believable scenario considering how often that seems to actually happen. If you’re rich and powerful you can get away with a lot of shit for a long time, as we all know.

When I read the original story on Kotaku I thought he should step down before I even got to the whole underage porn/exposure stuff.

A game studio CEO of a very successful developing house has plenty of funds to invest in real estate speculation, something a savvy lawyer can use when negotiating for said real estate. It's a smart way to spread and hope for growth, so I don't see cloak and dagger danger on its face.

Ugly story top to bottom. I'm more convinced that Pitchford siphoned money off than he held some secret paedophilia parties. And his pornographic interests, however lewd they may be, really is a private matter if the 'performer' involved is of a legal age. If anything it only serves to damage his public face than be held against him in court. Why he would keep that stuff on a USB stick I don't know, other than as a truly weird curiosity to show friends, like teenage boys do.

I get the feeling nobody is going to come out of this smelling like roses.

Poor Johnny V. Dude finally gets a new gig and then this shit happens!

January 10th: Hey I wonder why we haven't heard anything about Borderlands 3?

January 11th: Oh.

Seeing how this is a retaliation suite i wouldn't take much of it to heart. I would let the courts settle it before i make a judgement. Pitchford always came off as scammy but doesn't mean any of this is true.

lol. I like the emphasis.

@dudeglove: Pitchford isn't just the CEO of a video game company. He's a successful businessman with several businesses in his portfolio including Gearbox, his co-owned gaming cafe with his wife, he's on the board of Fig and he runs a magic company called Pitchford Entertainment, Media and Magic, LLC which in turn owns a magazine business. That he would take some of his wealth and invest in real estate is a pretty understandable business proposition. Remember, he lost millions of personal money in embezzlement from an assistant and he came out and said it was no big deal financially and that he'd be ok, he just felt (justifiably) done wrong.

His excuse of "downloaded for magic research" is amazing. How is he going to work that one into a trick at PAX this year?

Nice, how will the giantbomb guys defend him this time?

@farleyslundgren: He apparently deleted that, but the dude needs a lawyer to tell him to STFU at this point.

oh jesus christ.

WHAT IS THAT TWEET? WHY MAKE IT?

Agreed!

@vortextk: because he wants you to know all his porn is totally legal.

Randy, just because Elon Musk smoked weed on a podcast doesn’t mean you need to one-up him in the scuzzy CEO Olympics.

And here i thought Johnny V putting porn on a PSP was weird.

@soulcake: I mean, who DIDN'T have porn on a PSP back in those days, assuming they were old enough to care about porn?

But anyway... This is some crazy shit.

What makes you think the staff is approving of his behavior? They have made fun of him many times on previous podcasts/shows

Not a good look that's for sure. Gotta say a "peacock" party is new to me.

@puchiko: @bigbadbieber: I'm fairly sure they've said Pitchford is quite the character. Historically they would say he came off as very enthusiastic for his games and games in general, but that he also has a big mouth and engages the internet crowd a bit too much.

@rahf: My point is that the staff in no way endorses his alleged illegal behavior. Not sure why this user has a grudge against the staff and assumes they will defend anyone just because they are someone who has been a friend of the site in the past.

@puchiko: Oh hell no, for two reasons: firstly because the staff has integrity and tact. And then there's no way you can defend his comments with a "Oh, Randy, you silly boy!" Not in today's polarized and reactionary social climate. Right or wrong you stand to gain nothing by defending a person in that situation, as the fan spins up and poop is sailing towards its blades.

I think there multiple episodes where Jeff makes dumb puns of Randy Pitchford being a magician. So i find it weird that people would say "Nice, how will the giantbomb guys defend him this time?"

This might be a side note, but does anyone else find it weird to come to conclusions about things like the integrity or character of a person based on what is given to you via media, social or otherwise? Like, I feel a little weird having an opinion on something like this, for Pitchford and the lawyer, when I don't have a full story and haven't even met these guys in the first place. It's one of the many reasons I don't follow entertainment news.

@jasonr86 said:

On the one hand, I agree with the general sentiment of not passing judgement quickly. On the other hand, any version of the full story you can concoct here is pretty eff'd up. Just look at the lawyer. He's alleging child abuse, which is a mandatory report in Texas, including by lawyers. So by even making the accusation, he's pretty much outing that he didn't do the thing, you know, he was legally required to do.

There are more red flags here than a meeting of the Communist Party. I don't think this is a case of two people arguing over different interpretations of events. If even a small part of either complaint is true, the situation is seriously messed up. Either they are both completely lying or someone is in major trouble.

Is this hobby grade?

Never trust a magician.

It's a story that I find impossible to comment on either way. Someone is messing up real bad on one or both sides. That's kinda all there is to it until more details come out.

On a similar note, it's truly insane seeing people defend Pitchford on Twitter because they like Borderlands. It's wild how confidently people will defend someone they don't know for the most frivolous and unrelated reasons. Just messy all around.

It's insane to see people defend him because I've literally only ever seen the man be viciously mocked for being kind of a weird dude.

That's just the normal state of things so adding this...

I downloaded the Piff podcast to hear this train wreck

@bisonhero: I believe the abs in question are hobby-grade

@jasonr86: Yes. It’s okay to see a story, process it, say “oh, okay,” and move on.

The best opinions are formed over reading one take, then another, maybe another still, being critical of all of them, and taking the time to make sense of things for yourself.

I don't like his companies ethics for selling game; so end of story for me caring about his company. Yet, he seems like a dirtbag too even if teh worst he did was what is in teh public record, so for all the women who he has crossed paths with...sorry, that he exists.