The Duke of Fremont took one of the worst beats of his life this June. (Photo: AllVegasPoker.com)

59-year-old Ron Wall has been a fixture of downtown Las Vegas poker for years, though most people there know him as The Duke of Fremont because of his colorful get-up. Dressed in hand-designed suits, fedoras, scarves and pinky rings, Wall plays up his character while he’s fleecing players at Fremont Street poker rooms - but he almost didn’t make it back to Fremont to keep playing after a vicious attack when he went to buy gold and silver at a Primm, Nev., casino in June.

Wall visited Whiskey Pete’s casino in Primm on June 26 with $137,000 in cash to buy gold and silver from a man he had dealt with before. But upon entering the hotel room he was immediately attacked by the man and a woman, who beat him severely for 20 minutes with anything they could get their hands on, breaking his ribs, cheekbones and nose. Despite a concussion, Wall managed to stay conscious while he was beaten, stabbed and later tied up with phone cords and duct tape; during a lull he made his escape from the room and got to the hotel’s registration desk, where police were called to the scene.

Three days later Wall picked Edmond Price out of a police lineup, and he was also able to identify Victoria Elizabeth Edelman, Price’s girlfriend, as the woman who attacked him in the hotel room. Edelman is now being held in the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas on $2 million bail, while Price remains in a California jail. The two are suspected of using Wall’s cash from the incident to hire their defense attorneys.

The longtime poker player, meanwhile, continues to attend physical therapy sessions after undergoing surgery for his numerous wounds. He is now back at the tables in downtown Las Vegas entertaining poker rooms as The Duke of Fremont.

Just when Snoop Dogg thought he was out, they pulled him right back in.

There was a time when all that Snoop Dogg did was make records and music videos, occasionally guest-star in a television series or a movie, and coach his youth football team. He had the good life - but that was before the Mafia Wars mafia of Las Vegas got hold of him. The evil Mafia Wars mafia stole Snoop’s career from him and made him just another tool for evil. They made him do what the Don ordered - and since the Don is evil incarnate, many of those orders included unspeakable atrocities. Ever seen Soul Plane? Then you know the tip of the iceberg of harm that the Mafia Wars mafia has brought down on Snoop Dogg.

At one point there was hope that Snoop Dogg would rebound, that he would be able to find a way back to the picket-fence life that every other superstar rapper enjoys in America. But every time he thought he was out, the Mafia Wars mafia pulled him right back in. After some time, Snoop Dogg began to revel in his duties for the them, even working his way up to the point where he was doing personal assignments directly for the Don. And the Don, well, he reveled in Snoop Dogg's ruthless efficiency and solid Protestant work ethic. One day, the Don told Snoop Dogg that if he could do one job particularly well, he’d become his right-hand man for life.

“What is the job, Don?” asked Snoop Dogg.

“Blow up a four-ton armored truck,” said the Don. “In the middle of the desert outside Las Vegas.”

"Will there be rival gang members inside it?" asked Snoop Dogg.

"No," replied the Don.

"Will I be pulling off a multimillion-dollar heist? Will I blow up the armored car to destroy evidence of my crime?" asked Snoop Dogg.

"No," replied the Don.

“Then why would I blow up an armored car in the middle of the desert, Don?”

“I told you never to question my orders!” the Don shouted, pounding a fist into his desk. Snoop Dogg flinched, ever so slightly, but the Don ignored this and calmed his breathing before continuing. “But because you have served me so well, Snoop Dogg...because I like you…I will tell you why. I want to celebrate the 10,000,000th visitor to Mafia Wars: Las Vegas, and let's face it, nothing says ‘MAFIA4LYFE’ quite like an armored car being ‘sploded by a rapper.”

“Brilliant in its simplicity, Don,” said Snoop Dogg. “Maybe I could ‘splode this armored car on Thursday, August 19. Maybe at, say, 6 p.m. PT? And maybe we could even stream it live on the Mafia Wars website so people all over could watch the 'splosion.”

“Snoop Dogg, my son,” said the Don, clasping his hands to Snoop Dogg's face and pulling him near, “you will go far in this life. You will go far.”

Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian heat up the action in Las Vegas. (photos courtesy of XS Tryst Las Vegas and WireImage)

Do you ever have one of those nights where you're a spoiled, rich celebutante, and you show up at an exclusive Vegas nightclub only to find there's already another spoiled, rich celebutante there, hogging all the attention? If you have, you obviously know how infuriating it can be. So, it's not surprising that Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton got into a little cat fight when they both made an appearance at the Lavo nightclub in Las Vegas on the same night.

Apparently Kardashian was the first on the scene, arriving early to celebrate the club's two year anniversary with some dinner and drinks (and collect a six-figure "appearance fee", no doubt). But the fun started when Hilton arrived, after taking in the Lady Gaga show first, and noticed she wasn't the only millionaire heiress in the house.

Hilton immediately tried to take over the party, even urging the resident DJ to spin her 2006 flop "Stars are Blind". The song came on, the crowd laughed, and Kardashian took over the microphone, saying "Now let's hear some real music!"

The two then sat at the same table but ignored each other completely. The whole brouhaha is apparently part of an ongoing feud, started when Hilton started hanging out with Kardashian's ex-beau, Reggie Bush. Unfortunately for us all, the two young women didn't actually come to blows, and no nails were broken, or hair pulled out. But there's always next time...

The Macau casinos that are keeping world gambling profits afloat.

Over the last year or two, the biggest casino operators in the world have been suffering right along with the world economy. Visitor numbers are down, revenues are down and profits are way down. And things would be dire indeed for companies like Wynn Resorts, MGM and Sands, if not for one thing...their Macau casinos are rolling in dough.

Compared to the same time period last year, Macau gaming revenue jumped 70% in July of this year. That meant very good news for Wynn Resorts, and surprisingly okay news for the Las Vegas Sands Corp. They still lost money this quarter, but they lost a lot less than expected, due to good numbers in Macau. They only lost $4.7 million in the 2nd quarter of 2010, compared to the $222 million they lost in that same period last year.

MGM Resorts International is reeling, due mainly to their large investment in Vegas' underwhelming City Center complex. They reported an $883 million net loss in Q2 of 2010. But, again, the numbers across the Pacific were much better. Their 50% stake in the MGM Grand Macau brought in $40 million bucks over this last quarter.

So the next time you're on the strip in Sin City, look around at all those massive monuments to the almighty dollar, and reflect that each of them is costing its parent company money. And if it weren't for a booming gambling market in China, you might be seeing a whole lot of "For Sale" signs on Vegas' biggest casinos.

Jennifer Harman will be recognized for her long-term success later this year.

The Women in Poker Hall of Fame has announced its inductees for the Class of 2010, including two of the most successful women ever to play the game.

Jennifer Harman, the last of the three inductees for 2010, has also enjoyed her share of success in tournament poker with two World Series of Poker bracelets, three World Poker Tour final tables and $2.6 million to her credit. But she is perhaps best known as a regular in some of the biggest live cash games in Las Vegas, regularly winning in high-stakes mixed games with the world’s top poker players.

Kathy Liebert has won more money playing tournament poker than any other woman in history. With more than $5.7 million in tournament earnings, her resume includes a WSOP bracelet, a WPT win and seven WPT final tables, and the distinction of being the first woman ever to win $1 million in a single poker tournament.

Posthumous inductee Billie Brown worked in the poker industry for decades, pioneering the marketing of tournament poker in Las Vegas during the 1980s by offering the first-ever guaranteed prize pool. Later she created the California State Ladies Poker Championship, making her a perfect fit for the Women in Poker Hall of Fame.

The three women will be inducted into the Women in Poker Hall of Fame in a ceremony at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas on September 3.

If Harrah's were the Jackson family, the Rio would be Tito.

It looks like the World Series of Poker will be moving to a new home next year - or maybe not, depending on whose word you take.

Popular poker blog Pokerati.com announced on Wednesday that the sale of the Rio, the Harrah’s property that has been home to the WSOP since it moved away from downtown Las Vegas back in 2006, was “almost 100 percent unofficially semi-confirmed” to “one of those name name and ampersand venture capital companies.” The Pokerati post also indicated that the WSOP would be moving to Planet Hollywood, which Harrah’s acquired last year, which seemed to confirm the rumors that have been flying around for months that the WSOP was finally making its way to the Las Vegas Strip.

But it didn’t take long for WSOP officials to react to the new tale of the Rio’s demise. Seth Palansky, director of communications for the WSOP, shot down the rumors yesterday, noting that planning was already underway for holding the 2011 WSOP at the Rio, including another installment of the November Nine at the Penn and Teller Theater. And the recently released Q2 2010 earnings statement for Harrah’s mentions nothing about the Rio being sold; in fact, the company lost more than $270 million last quarter, a number that would have been more than offset by the sale of such a big Las Vegas property.

So for now, it looks like the WSOP is staying put. Just don’t expect the rumors to die down; some of them have had the property being sold but Harrah’s continuing to host the venerable tournament series onsite as part of the sale, so the buzz will likely continue all the way through the next World Series of Poker at the Rio.

The iconic Wynn Las Vegas struggles, while its sister casinos in Macau rake it in.

While the recession may be slowing things down in Las Vegas, profits overseas are soaring for Wynn Resorts, Ltd. The casino operator, which owns Wynn Las Vegas on the Vegas strip, and a host of other properities, doubled its profits in Q2.

Most of the good news came from their casinos in Macau, the only place in China with legalized gambling. Wynn's revenues there rose by 74%, with the amount spent on gambling on its properties rising by 72% versus the same period last year.

Interestingly, a lot of that extra profit came from something every gambler knows something about - runnning hot. The average house edge at a major casino is somewhere between 2.7 and 3% For Q2, Wynn's Macau properties won 3.2%. And that little difference accounted for a big difference in their bottom line.

Despite the seemingly good news, and an annoucement that the company is cautiously optimistic about a rebound in Vegas, their share prices actually took a dip. And that's pretty clear evidence that investors don't necessarily see things in Vegas, and around the world, turning around right away.

Don't worry, none of the TI Sirens were harmed in the robbery.

According to early reports, there was an armed robbery at Treasure Island Casino in Las Vegas, just before 10pm last night. There aren't many details yet (apparently the Vegas media is still recovering from the grind of the WSOP) but the rumor is that an armed man help up a casino cage at the popular hotel/casino and got away with a bag of loot, literally.

But he didn't get far before police closed in on him in the parking lot of The Mirage, next door to TI. After the police spent several hours searching every floor of the garage they eventually found the bag of money, but not the robber.

It's not known how much money he managed to, briefly, steal, but police say the casino told them it wasn't a "huge" amount.

There are no leads on the man's identity so far, or if there is, they're not saying. But they are asking anyone with any knowledge of the crook's identity to call Crime Stoppers.

Cake Poker regular Joe Curcio cashed for $72,591 at the Venetian DSE III Main Event last week. (Photo: PokerNews)

Earlier this month we told you a bit about Cake Poker high stakes regular Joe Curcio, who managed to cash twice at this year’s World Series of Poker, including an eighth-place finish in one of the last preliminary events before the Main Event kicked off. That was good for $78,705 - not a bad take for his first WSOP final table.

The WSOP Main Event didn’t go quite as well for Joe. Since he had planned on being in Las Vegas for a bit longer than his Main Event finish warranted, he decided to head over to the Strip and try his luck in the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza III Main Event. The DSE III, which ran concurrently with this year’s WSOP, sported small buy-ins for most of its tournaments. Many were at the $340 and $550 levels, but the Main Event cost $4,850. 

Unsurprisingly, that tournament drew a tough field of 282 players, continuing a trend of strong attendance that held up all summer. The DSE III Main Event field included plenty of skilled players who had for one reason or another busted from the WSOP Main Event earlier than they had planned. And once again Joe, the online high-stakes cash game player who says he hates live poker, tasted live tournament success in Las Vegas: he finished in fifth place at Venetian for a payday of $72,591.

“It was a really tough field and a grueling 4 days of deep-stacked poker,” Joe told us, “but I learned a lot and it was really interesting to say the least.”

So congratulations are in order once again for Joe Curcio. Two final table scores for $70K each is never a bad way to end a summer of poker in Las Vegas!

Shawn Marion returns to home turf for his poker tournament in Las Vegas.

NBA All-Star Shawn Marion came out to play in the WSOP Main Event this year. Now he’s inviting the poker world to join him in his own charity poker tournament this weekend at the Palms Casino in Las Vegas.

The Dallas Mavericks forward has invited his friends in basketball, poker and the rest of the entertainment industry to take part in the Shawn Marion Foundation Celebrity Charity Poker Tournament from 2-7 p.m. this Saturday, July 24, 2010. The organization was founded by the former University of Nevada-Las Vegas star in 2008 to provide college scholarships to single mothers to help break the cycle of low-paying jobs and limited opportunities.

Joining Marion at the tournament will be Miami Heat superstar Dwyane Wade, 2010 World Poker Tour Championship winner David Williams, The Bachelor’s Bob Guiney, actor and charity poker regular Mekhi Phifer, House of Payne stars Lance Gross and Denyce Walton, True Blood star Natasha Alam, Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho from The Amazing Race, and poker player and Celebrity Apprentice star Annie Duke.

"It is exciting to bring the world of poker and entertainment together while raising awareness to help single parents," Marion said. “I know what it feels like to have nothing. My mom is a wonderful and strong woman who worked two jobs for a long time to put food on the table to feed us and my mission is to help other single parents in the same predicament.” 

Entries for the tournament are $250. For more information check out the Shawn Marion Foundation website.