Chess grandmaster Hans Niemann settled a defamation lawsuit after accusations he cheated in a match using anal beads.
Last year, we reported on the peculiar story of cheating allegations against Hans Neimann. The American chess grandmaster beat Norwegian world champion Magnus Carlsen in a chess match in September last year.
Upset by the defeat to the 19-year-old Neimann, Carlsen made a rather butt-clenching accusation. He said that Neimann had cheated by using wireless vibrating anal beads.
After a 53 game winning streak, Carlsen was beaten by Neimann at the Sinquefield Cup in Saint Louis. Neimann was the lowest ranked player at the competition and the first to beat Carlsen in two years.
Carlsen later withdrew from the tournament and made a statement with his accusations against Niemann. Further complicating things, Niemann admitted to having previously cheated on online matches on Chess.com, leading to his private removal from the site. He claims he’s never cheated in real life matches though.
It’s unclear exactly where the rumour that Niemann had used vibrating anal beads to cheat first appeared from, but it spread across the internet bringing attention to the accusations after Elon Musk posted about it.
Niemann filed a lawsuit against Carlsen, Chess.com and player Hikaru Nakamura for defamation.
Although the $100 million (EUR92 million) lawsuit was thrown out by the courts in October, the parties have now negotiated a private settlement.
“At this time, Hans has been fully reinstated to Chess.com, and we look forward to his participation in our events. We would also like to reaffirm that we stand by the findings in our October 2022 public report regarding Hans, including that we found no determinative evidence that he has cheated in any in-person games. We all love chess and appreciate all of the passionate fans and community members who allow us to do what we do,” a statement from Chess.com read.
Carlsen has acknowledged the report from Chess.com and has said he is “willing to play Niemann in future events, should we be paired together.”
“I am pleased that my lawsuit against Magnus Carlsen and Chess.com has been resolved in a mutually acceptable manner, and that I am returning to Chess.com. I look forward to competing against Magnus in chess rather than in court and am grateful to my attorneys at Oved & Oved for believing in me and helping me resolve the case,” Niemann said.