Pulsz Wisconsin Lawsuit: Owner Accused of Illegal Gambling

A Wisconsin player is suing Yellow Social Interactive, the company behind Pulsz, claiming Pulsz is illegal gambling under Wisconsin's law for recovering money wagered, in a case the operator moved to federal court in Milwaukee on October 23, 2026.

The suit also brings fraud, contract and unjust-enrichment claims, and one count alone seeks $351,509.

The case is Schmitz v. Yellow Social Interactive, Limited and YSI US, Inc., now No. 2:26-cv-01968 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. We have not read the complaint itself, which is not freely available. Everything below about the plaintiff's claims comes from the defendants' own notice of removal and the federal docket. These are allegations, and no court has ruled on them.

Who is suing Pulsz in Wisconsin, and what for?

According to the notice of removal, plaintiff Jennifer Schmitz of Mount Calvary, Wisconsin, filed suit on September 14, 2026 in the Fond du Lac County Circuit Court, case No. 2026-CV-000473. The notice summarises her claims this way:

Plaintiff's allegations against Defendants claim violations of: Wis. Stat. § 895.056; Wis. Stat. § 100.18; Wis. Stat. § 806.04; and Wisconsin common law in the form of breach of contract and unjust enrichment, arise from Defendants' publication of online games, which Plaintiff claims are part of an illegal gambling website under Wisconsin law.

Section 100.18 is headed "Fraudulent representations" and section 806.04 is the "Uniform declaratory judgments act". On the money, the notice says that "in Count II alone, Plaintiff seeks pecuniary loss 'presently calculated at $351,509.00,' along with costs and attorneys' fees." It does not say which statute Count II rests on, and we do not know what the other counts seek. The wording is a clue rather than an answer: a claim for "pecuniary loss" plus costs and attorney fees matches the remedy in section 100.18(11)(b)2, the fraudulent-representations law, while section 895.056 speaks of recovering "the property" wagered. So the $351,509 figure should not be read as the amount of gambling losses being reclaimed until the complaint itself is public.

The notice does not name Pulsz. The link comes from other court records. A 2023 federal order in Delaware states that "Plaintiff Yellow Social Interactive Limited (YSI) operates a website called pulsz.com", and the official settlement website for a separate class action names both Pulsz Casino and Pulsz Bingo as YSI's games. Our Yellow Social Interactive operator profile covers the company in more detail.

What does Wisconsin's gambling loss recovery law say?

Section 895.056 is titled "Recovery of money wagered". It lets a "wagerer", defined as anyone who stakes or loses property "by playing at any game" or betting on an uncertain result, sue to get it back. The deadlines are short:

Subsection (4) excludes property "permitted to be played, bet or wagered" under chapters 562 to 569 or under state or federal laws on gaming on Indian lands. Wisconsin's criminal code defines a bet in section 945.01(1) as "a bargain in which the parties agree that, dependent upon chance even though accompanied by some skill, one stands to win or lose something of value specified in the agreement". The notice does not say which provisions the complaint relies on to call Pulsz illegal gambling, so we cannot tell you whether it turns on that definition. Sweeps operators argue that free entry routes (AMOE) mean no one has to pay to play for prizes. Our guide to sweepstakes casino legality explains that argument.

The short windows matter for anyone weighing a similar claim, because the statute measures time from each stake or delivery, not from when a player decides to sue. How a court counts those windows for a sweeps account is untested as far as we know. Talk to a Wisconsin lawyer before relying on any reading of it.

Why did Pulsz move the case to federal court?

The notice relies on diversity jurisdiction. It says YSI is incorporated in Gibraltar and YSI US in Delaware, and that the amount at stake exceeds the $75,000 federal threshold. The defendants also say they "do not consent to this Court's exercise of personal jurisdiction over them" and "reserve the right to move for dismissal on that ground." Duane Morris represents both defendants. Luke P. Hudock of Hudock Law Group represents Schmitz, according to the docket.

As of October 24 the federal docket shows only the notice of removal and a clerk's notice assigning the case to Magistrate Judge Nancy Joseph. No answer, motion or ruling has been filed. The case so far:

1. September 14, 2026: Schmitz files in Fond du Lac County Circuit Court, case No. 2026-CV-000473.
2. October 22, 2026: the defendants' notice of removal is dated.
3. October 23, 2026: the notice is filed in the Eastern District of Wisconsin, opening No. 2:26-cv-01968.
4. October 24, 2026: the docket shows only that notice and the clerk's notice assigning Magistrate Judge Nancy Joseph.

YSI has fought player claims elsewhere, including suing two of its own players in Delaware in 2023 over how far their arbitration claims could reach. The Wisconsin notice does not mention arbitration.

Does this affect Pulsz players in Wisconsin today?

Not directly. Nothing in the filing changes Pulsz's terms or its state list, and Wisconsin is not on either Pulsz brand's excluded-state list in our data. Wisconsin players are also outside the separate Pulsz class settlement. The Pulsz settlement covers only players in Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, New Jersey and Massachusetts, according to its official website.

Wisconsin still has no sweepstakes ban or pending bill that we know of, and our Wisconsin page still lists the state as open. Two things make that less settled than it was. Wisconsin's Department of Justice has been suing prediction-market platforms since April 23, 2026 over what it calls disguised sports betting, though not any sweepstakes casino. And this case is a private lawsuit arguing that a major sweeps site is illegal gambling under Wisconsin law. Players have brought similar money-recovery suits in Kentucky courts, including one against Zula Casino that was dismissed, and a private company is suing operator groups over South Carolina players' gambling losses.

If you play Pulsz in Wisconsin, your account, coins and Sweeps Coins redemptions are unaffected by this filing. If you are weighing a loss-recovery claim of your own, the windows in the table above are the reason not to wait, and Pulsz's terms send disputes to arbitration, which our report on the Pulsz arbitration fight in Delaware explains. If you are choosing where to play, compare operators on our best sweepstakes casinos list.

Sources & documents

• Federal docket, Schmitz v. Yellow Social Interactive, E.D. Wis. 2:26-cv-01968 and its parties list, read October 24, 2026.
• Notice of Removal, ECF No. 1, dated October 22 and filed October 23, 2026. This is the only filing we have read. It is a defendants' document summarising the plaintiff's complaint, so the description of the claims is single-sourced to it.
• Wis. Stat. § 895.056, § 945.01, § 100.18 and § 806.04, read through archived copies of the Wisconsin Legislature's site because the live site did not respond to us on October 24.
• Memorandum order, Yellow Social Interactive Ltd v. Ebersole, D. Del. 1:23-cv-00352, October 11, 2023, for the link between YSI and pulsz.com.
• Robinson v. Yellow Social Interactive settlement website, read October 24, 2026, for the class states.
• Wisconsin Department of Justice press release, April 23, 2026, announcing suits against Kalshi, Robinhood, Coinbase, Polymarket and Crypto.com.

All quotations are verbatim. We could not read the Fond du Lac County record because Wisconsin's court-access site requires a captcha. We have no comment from Yellow Social Interactive or the plaintiff's lawyer. How we verify explains our sourcing rules.

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