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Rattlesnake conspirators charged

2007-08-20 11:53:57

Two Colorado men have been charged with conspiracy to commit murder after threatening a poker boss with rattlesnakes.

Matthew Sowash, owner of Amateur Poker Tour, was threatened with prospect of snake bites because he owed $60,000, but he contacted Sowash police after receiving threatening emails.

Herbert Paul Beck, 56, and Christopher Lee Steelman, 34, have now been charged with suspicion of conspiracy to commit murder, as well as conspiracy to commit kidnapping and extortion.

According to affidavits, the plan was to build a wooden box to hold the snakes and ''the lid was to be built to allow Sowash's legs to be put inside but not pulled out".

The debt collectors would then have left the rattlesnake-bitten poker chief on a hiking trail.

Colorado investigator Lance Clem told CW2 News that it sounded like something "out of the Old West".

"You've got rattlesnakes, poker, some unsavory characters - all the elements of things that have gone on in this part of the country for a long, long time."

Mr Sowash's company stages Texas Hold'em poker games in bars in and around Denver.

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