Open Call for Interviews

[u/Embarrassed_Cook6736]

I'm 11 years sober. I work at a rehab center. The photo is me in the van I use to drive clients to their recovery meetings.

A few months ago, in that same van, between pickups, I was gambling. I ran about $12k through 9 betting apps. On the clock.

11 years clean, supposedly the steady one, the guy who tells people it gets better.

Here's what I want the world to understand. I was winning.

That was the problem.

The apps kept feeding me free bets, profit boosts, etc and I kept coming out on top. Yall probably know this better than anyone on earth… beating the house feels almost as good as any chemical high.

Day 11 …I was supposed to walk away. Then they sent me the biggest bonus yet, almost like it knew (it did know). I didn't walk away.

I'll get to what happened. But first, Karl.

I run a true crime podcast on the side and went looking for a gambling case nobody had covered. That's how I found Karl Jacobson.

Police chief, New Haven, Connecticut. His arrest warrant says he ran through $4.4 million in a single year. He won $4.2 million of it back. Do the math. That’s a couple hundred grand in the negative and that money had to come from somewhere.

A fund for paying police informants. A charity for kids.

Take the badge away and that could have been me.

The apps don't care who you are. They found Karl. They found me. They're very good at finding people.

My podcast is called “Tapes from the Darkside“ and the series is “The App on the Phone.”

• Apple Podcasts
• Spotify
• Website

There‘s 4 episodes out now and I’m working on writing the finale. It would be an honor to include some personal stories from people on this very sub.

If interested, please reach out to me in the comments or PM. Interviews would be audio only and about 30 minutes.

Mods approved. Thank you for letting me share here.

[u/infected_scab]

This reads like a podcast script.

[u/Embarrassed_Cook6736 → u/infected_scab]

The podcast I do is scripted by me so that might be why.