Last Thursday, longtime PocketFives member Dan WretchyMartin (pictured) Tweeted about a run-in he had with security at the Venetian in Las Vegas: “Was just 86’d for life from Venetian for smoking weed in my car in the parking lot by myself. Was also arrested. #dontsmokethere.” He outlined the aftermath: “It was my first time in handcuffs… Wasn’t very cool, luckily I had two really cool guys from metro who cut me a break… I’m appealing the 86, hopefully I can have some help.”

What followed was a Free Wretchy movement on Twitter that featured a variety of poker pros and community members lending their support to Martin. He Tweeted, “I want to say thanks to everyone out there supporting me, it means a lot. Let’s get this thing overturned! #FreeWretchy.”

Mazin Khoury, who finished fifth in a Six-Max event during the World Series of Poker (WSOP) last year for $121,000, was among those supporting Martin. Khoury Tweeted, “Obviously it goes without saying, but I’m in support of the #FreeWretchy movement. @VenetianPoker. Punishment doesn’t fit the crime.”

Marcus SCripshow23 Steinhauer chimed in on Twitter, “Idk much about @Wretchy, but I’m on board with his freedom. @VenetianPoker how many ppl was he bothering by getting zoned in? #FreeWretchy.”

Lending its advice was the poker blog Pokerati, which Tweeted, “innocent til proven guilty? plead not guilty to the charges and they’ve got no grounds til court says otherwise.”

Longtime PocketFives member Jennifer Jennicide Leigh (pictured) gave her two cents while playing with Martin elsewhere in Las Vegas in the days since the arrest: “Not a dream starting table, @argentinaboy and @wretchy here, but we’re starting a #savewretchy campaign.”

Given Martin’s longtime involvement on PocketFives, where he’s been a member since our first year in business, we reached out to him for comment. He told us in an exclusive statement, “I’ve been trying to talk to the Investigations Department at the Venetian, but I haven’t received a call back or anything yet. I’m pretty upset about the situation, but the only thing I can do now is focus on the WSOP and earn my live stripes in that arena.”

Two Plus Two has a thread with nearly 300 replies about the incident, which has grabbed the attention of the poker world. Martin admitted, “I really didn’t want to be the forefront of the ‘allow smoking weed for poker players’ movement that’s happening, I just wanted to inform the community so nobody made the same mistake I did.”

Martin’s fate is still up in the air. “Now that it has blown up, I think it’s something that can be hopefully overturned and looked at differently in the eyes of people who have no idea what kind of stuff goes on behind the poker scenes,” Martin, (pictured with jaybone2315) in recent days, observed. “All of this negativity for poker isn’t a good thing. We need to rally as a community and really have some leaders who step up in the public eye in situations like this to show how the community feels about it in an intelligent and professional manner.”

One Two Plus Two member pointed out that the Venetian can be fairly stringent: “The Venetian has a history of being very strict on or even in front of the property.”

Another poker player questioned, “And who was he hurting? Funny how casinos will give their customers cheap or free alcoholic drinks in order for them to get a bit tanked and gamble off everything, but if they get caught smoking a little weed, then they must be evil people.”

Martin has over $3 million in online tournament winnings in his PocketFives profile and has made over 5,500 posts on PocketFives. His largest tracked cash was officially worth $160,000 and came as a result of a PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker victory in 2010.