ESIC Receives Appeals and Asks Valve to Rethink CS:GO Sanctions

The Esports Integrity Commission (ESIC), the independent regulatory commission known as the integrity esports watchdog, released a statement regarding appeals it received late last week. ESIC pointed out that the appeals are tied to its massive investigation and judgments related to the CS:GO spectator bug.

Two Coaches File Appeals with ESIC

The Commission announced that it received two appeal requests on July 5, 2022, following the publications of its sanctions, as well as the sanctions imposed by the publisher of CS:GO, Valve. The appeals were submitted by Alessandro “Apoka” Marcucci and Nicholas “Guerri” Nogueira. The duo are both represented by the same attorney, Luiz Felipe Maia.

Although the complaints were received outside of the window for appeals, the ESIC Commissioner decided to review them. The esports integrity watchdog explained that the two appeals were related to ESIC’s sanctions which were “compounded” by the sanctions subsequently imposed by Valve. This, according to ESIC, worsened the effect of the initially intended sanctions. At the same time, the Commission pointed out that its sanctions combined with Valve’s sanctions were out of proportion.

“Despite these appeals being made significantly out of the window of allowable appeals, the ESIC Commissioner exercised his discretion to allow the out of time appeals as he agreed that the subsequently notified Valve Sanctions had distorted the intended effect of the ESIC Sanctions such that they were no longer proportionate nor within the scope of ESIC’s intended outcome when the sanctions were determined and issued,“

reads a statement released by ESIC

ESIC Asks Valve to Rethink Sanctions

The appeals resulted in changing the calculation of the demerit points by ESIC. However, the Commission explained that the change in question and “the finding of the Independent Appeals Panel was entirely necessitated by the Valve Sanctions.” The esports integrity guardian pointed out that the publisher isn’t one of its members.

Valve was notified about the recent changes and ESIC said it hopes that the developer will take proper action and rethink its sanctions. However, according to the Commission, the initial response of the developer “indicates that they will not make that adjustment.”

It was back in September 2020 when ESIC first released preliminary findings regarding its investigation into CS:GO’s spectator bug. Overall, the probe found that 37 CS:GO coaches used the spectator bug and imposed sanctions. Then, in January 2021, Valve released its RMR update. The update came along with sanctions imposed by Valve that sought to “translate ESIC demerits into Major ineligibility.”