A gang of thieves and murderers filled the Bellagio's Fontana Room Tuesday for the third day of the Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic, with 84 people falling victim to a poker crime spree perpetrated by the 55 who now remain in contention for the crown.

Some went quietly, like Kevin Saul, who led here at Bellagio yesterday for one brief shining moment. His chips were stolen early on, getting ripped off by a jack on the river to leave his pocket queens penniless.

Others, like Phil Hellmuth, did not leave without making some noise. When this whole mess started this past Saturday, Phil showed up three levels late and still managed to grab the end of Day 1a chip lead. Then he stayed in the top 10 after only missing one level to start Day 2.

He showed up on time today though, and lost just about every pot he played. Eventually he was shot down on the river when trip aces turned into a full house to crush his flush. With no one to blame but the poker gods, he berated them on his way, saving the rest of the table the headache.

Coming off three cashes, including the Main Event at the 2008 WSOP, Evan McNiff played like a contract killer today, showing no remorse as he built his way up past the magic $1 million mark.

He'll come in with the chip lead and David "Chino" Rheem ready to stick the shiv in right behind on $905,000 in chips.

A product of my environment.

They popped the money bubble today in the third level, and it was Chino who did the dirty deed then.

With both a WSOP and WSOPC final table under his belt this year, Jason DeWitt looked good for a deep run here as the bubble neared. But just as the TD announced they were going hand-for-hand, he got into a $150k pot with Chino staring down a J♠ T♠ T♥ A♦ 9♥ board.

Dewitt bet $62k, Chino bet enough to cover his $200k and Jason just froze. Slowly but surely, as half the room began to crowd around the table, Dewitt went through the possibilities and somehow came up with a call.

It was bubble suicide as Chino rolled rockets, DeWitt was dead and Rheem was suddenly the chip boss, on his way to the second spot on the leaderboard at the end of the day.

Jack Wu has a couple of small California cashes this year and after winning his seat in a satellite, he was cutthroat today, sneaking up behind anyone who misjudged him and slaying his way to $847,000 in chips and third place right now.

Gunz come out.

Right behind him will be mad killer Steve Sung, who, it appears, is not satisfied with just the two WPT finals and two near misses he has on his sheet. Much the same way he wasn't happy just taking one player's tournament life when he flopped a set of jacks to crack his aces. This one was a multiple kill, as he took another short stack holding two picture cards on the way to building a $787,000 wall of clay when play finished.

Nick Schulman started out the day willing to take on anyone and everyone, getting it up over $400k after flopping a boat. This criminal mastermind is now prime shape to take over the whole operation, heading into Day 4 with $720,000 in his effort to add another title to his first-place and runner-up finishes here on the World Poker Tour.

Coming off deep runs at WPT Foxwoods the past two years, Arthur Azen is right there. As are WPT Title holder and two-time runner up Hoyt Corkins, two-time WPT final tablist and high-stakes tournament cash machine Amnon Fillipi, WSOP bracelet winner Robert Mizrachi, high-stakes cash-game stud Abe Mosseri, and WPT Borgata winner Johnny "World" Hennigan, all between $500,000 and $700,000 in chips.

Clonie Gowen's made over $600k on the tournament circuit this year, winning both a $5k here at Bellagio and another in Tunica, so it's no longer a shock that she's in that group as well.

It ain't safe no more.

Because he still had chips, French degenerate gambler David Benyamine spent the day away from the nosebleed cash games on Full Tilt, choosing instead to play props, betting $500 a point on the outcome of a series of flops with anyone who would take his action.

We can't say if he came out ahead, but he's still in it here on a healthy $500k stack and the prop game should be just as juicy tomorrow.

It was fitting that the name on the marquee made it to the money, but unfortunately that's pretty much all Doyle Brunson would do in this tournament. Antonio Esfandiari just cashed, then busted as well after entertaining us all with his prop bets the last two days - still lol at the Phil Laak J-Ko thing.

Victor Ramdin, Michael Binger, Dutch Boyd, Kristy Gazes and Annie Duke were also among the notables who cashed, but are no longer.

Team PokerStars Pro's Barry Greenstein found aces to cool off Minh Ly's kings and Jon Turner's big slick after the bubble burst on his way to becoming the biggest name in the group, sitting below Benyamine and near the average stack of $400k-plus.

Old-school hustler.

Day 2 chip leaders Justin Young and Kido Pham took a few licks today, but are right there as well, along with Full Tilt pros Allen Cunningham and David Oppenheim.

As usual, Dupo donkey Tim Vance assaulted just about everyone he came into contact with today and is just under there as well, with short stacks like Andy Bloch, Mike Matusow, Jonathan Little and the ever-present Nam Le below him. Although everyone in the room expects Nam to double up with aces or kings any minute now and get right back in it.

The 55 criminals still in the joint will be given yard time around 12 p.m., with plans to play down to at least the final 27 and PL.com watching their every move.

You let these types out of your sight for one minute and the silverware goes missing. Click here to see how it all shakes down Wednesday.