For information, here is the full text of the statement Lorenzo made on 21 Nov 2018 in response to the Facebook discussion, laying out his reasoning in this case.
Hello everyone,
I want to address the concerns that some members of the community expressed in a previous post here on Cyoubx’s Friends regarding the outcome of the WDC investigation about Fabiano Pereira’s results in blindfolded events.
I want to clarify from the beginning that I will not disclose all the evidence that the WDC has gathered in the last two months, because a good part of it consists of statements from multiple witnesses. No statement will be discussed here, nor any identity of the witnesses involved will be revealed. I have taken the decision of sharing some information, because I think that it’s important to reply to the concerns of the community, and I don’t have anything to hide.
Something else that I think is important to clarify is that nor I, nor the WDC, take any decision to ban people lightly. We evaluate carefully each and every aspect of our investigations. Banning someone is our last resort and it’s never an easy decision.
I’ll divide my considerations into points, to facilitate the reading. Please, take a moment to read the whole thing, let it sink into your mind and think about it before jumping to conclusion. Even if the whole thing is quite self-explanatory, in my opinion.
[Fabiano’s attitude] Fabio (I always called him “Fabio” during the investigation, so I’ll stick to it) immediately got on the defensive when we contacted him, never replied on point to our questions, always tried to mislead us when we confronted him with the accounts that multiple witnesses provided to us. When I say “defensive”, I don’t mean that he tried to defend himself providing explanations or evidence. I mean that he just refused to cooperate. When I asked him to provide the evidence that we needed, he indeed replied that he had no time to do it, but he also said that he didn’t see the point in sending it to me, so he decided to rest his case and he stated that he had no further comments.
[The evidence requested] I asked Fabio to send me the following evidence:
- A video of his solution of the 2nd scramble of the first round of 3x3 blindfolded at Mineirim Open Spring 2018, where he got the 28 single. I told him that he could solve while watching, because I was only interested in seeing his execution (of course, the solution had to be with the method he uses to solve the cube blindfolded);
- A video of a 4x4 solved with the method that he uses whilst blindfolded, but again I was only interested in seeing the execution, so he could have done it without memorizing without any problem on our part. I also asked for the scramble of the solve, in order to be able to follow what he did;
- The same for a 5x5.
I didn’t set any deadline, so there were no time constraints on our part. He just refused to do it. By the way, I watched all of his videos on his youtube channel and I must say that I think a lot of them are just fake/prepared solves.
[The video of the 28 single in 3x3 blind] Until this video emerged, Fabio never raised the concern that he could have received a mis-scramble. He confirmed he received the correct scramble at the competition in front of multiple people, when he was unaware of the existence of the video. In the unedited video (not the one on Fabio’s channel), it’s possible to see the execution of the last corners. They don’t match the official second scramble, nor any other scramble generated by TNoodle for the competition. Also, the execution is very, very slow. We also have another piece of evidence, a picture, that shows that the cube had all of its edges solved at around 14 seconds. Do the math.
[Fabio’s times in competitions] We have the scorecards of Mineirim Open Spring 2018 (September), we don’t recall times by memory. We have the scorecards of his attempts with the recorded time also for the DNFs, as it’s becoming more and more usual in WCA competitions, because of cumulative time limits. Therefore, I can say with absolute certainty that his times in blind events at this competition were:
- 3x3x3 Blindfolded
1st Round: DNF (1:40.18); 28.19; 50:01.
Final: DNF (55.38) ; DNF (56.17) ; DNF.
- 4x4x4 Blindfolded
Final: DNF (19:01); DNF (11:40); DNF (14:46)
- 5x5x5 Blindfolded
Final: DNF (33:46); DNF (22:45)
- 3x3x3 Multiple-Blindfolded
Final: 7/7 55:05
To give a little bit more context, at the Brazilian Championship in July, he obtained a successful solve in his first attempt in 4x4 Blindfolded in 16 minutes (which I deem plausible) and a 6 minutes success on his last attempt (which raises some eyebrows). In 5x5 Blindfolded he got a DNF in 37 minutes in his first attempt and a 9 minutes success in his last attempt (SAR at the time). Both the 6 minutes success in 4x4 Blindfolded and the 9 minutes success in 5x5 Blindfolded happened while there was no one else in the room, apart from Fabio and his judge, who was always the same guy and who is also the judge of the 28 single in 3x3 Blindfolded.
[The opinion of experts] The WDC consulted top level speedcubers, with results under 30 seconds in 3x3 Blindfolded, under 4 minutes in 4x4 Blindfolded and under 10 minutes in 5x5 Blindfolded. All of them helped us extensively during the analysis of Fabio’s times, videos, claimed methods of solution.
I’m going to end this post by saying that I also have a couple of ideas on how he cheated, but I have no proof. Hence, the one year ban. If I could prove what I think happened, Fabio would have been banned for at least three years. Since this is all speculation, I won’t disclose any of my opinions on the matter.
The decision about the length of the ban derives from an analogue case that happened in the past. Results that didn’t reflect the level of the speedcuber under investigation were DNFed and a one year ban was given after the speedcuber failed to prove his abilities in a Skype call with the WDC. Fabio didn’t even want to record a 30 seconds video for a 3x3 solution.
I saw some reference to Ushakov’s case in the comments of the other post. This is not like that case. Ushakov always replied on point to our questions, always cooperated during the investigation.
I’m still open to re-examine this case if new evidence arises, as it’s always the case with WDC investigations. Also, I informed Fabio that he has the right to appeal to the WEC if he thinks that the WDC decision is unfair. As far as I know, he has not appealed. He decided to bring the case on Facebook, instead.
Thanks for reading.
Best,
Lorenzo Vigani Poli
WDC Team Leader
. I would imagine it's perfectly feasible to cover two solving stations with a single camera so it'd probably require roughly half the number of cameras as StackMats needed for a comp. Then there are the logistics involved in what to do with the footage, how long to archive it in case of incident, all sorts of potential snags and added workload. 
