@cook (I'm not sure how it's wrong to post full articles if I link to the site....frankly isn't this what sites like Business Insider, Yahoo and Huff Post do?...whatever...below are relevant parts)
Washington Post: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6 million scheme has to pay it back, judge rules
Given the opportunity to make massive amounts of money, casinos can be unusually accommodating to wealthy baccarat players. Ivey was able to use this to his advantage. In each of his visits to the Borgata, the casino accepted the same five requests. Ivey asked: that he play in a private area; that the dealer speak Mandarin Chinese; that he play with eight decks of purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards shuffled together; that the decks be shuffled with an automatic shuffler; and that Ivey would be allowed one guest at the table, a woman named Cheng Yin Sun.
Sun had spent, according to the New York Times magazine, hundreds of hours memorizing tiny flaws in purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards.
She discovered that patterns on card backs, designed to be symmetrical, were not perfectly so. Sun trained herself to identify aberrations along the left or right margins of the card backs, no wider than 1/32 of an inch, the Times reported. (“Sun’s mental acumen in distinguishing the minute differences in the patterns on the back of the playing cards is remarkable,” Hillman noted.) So prepared, she helped Ivey on his way to millions.
Ivey’s attorney Ed Jacobs emphasized that Hillman did not describe the poker player’s actions as fraud. “What this ruling says is a player is prohibited from combining his skill and intellect and visual acuity to beat the casino at its own game,” the lawyer said, according to the Associated Press. “The casino agreed to every single accommodation requested by Phil Ivey in his four visits because they were eager to try to win his money.” The gambler was only using observation, the defense went, and rotating the cards was within the rules of the game. Jacobs added Ivey will appeal the ruling.
As for the $250,000 worth of comped goods and services that Borgata gave to Ivey and Sun, Hillman concluded that they did not owe the casino restitution. “Because the ‘comps’ were not tied to an obligation that Ivey win or lose, or do anything in particular except to visit Borgata,” he wrote, “Borgata is not entitled to the return of the value of those ‘comps’ as part of its breach of contract damages.”
Washington Post: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6 million scheme has to pay it back, judge rules
Given the opportunity to make massive amounts of money, casinos can be unusually accommodating to wealthy baccarat players. Ivey was able to use this to his advantage. In each of his visits to the Borgata, the casino accepted the same five requests. Ivey asked: that he play in a private area; that the dealer speak Mandarin Chinese; that he play with eight decks of purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards shuffled together; that the decks be shuffled with an automatic shuffler; and that Ivey would be allowed one guest at the table, a woman named Cheng Yin Sun.
Sun had spent, according to the New York Times magazine, hundreds of hours memorizing tiny flaws in purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards.
She discovered that patterns on card backs, designed to be symmetrical, were not perfectly so. Sun trained herself to identify aberrations along the left or right margins of the card backs, no wider than 1/32 of an inch, the Times reported. (“Sun’s mental acumen in distinguishing the minute differences in the patterns on the back of the playing cards is remarkable,” Hillman noted.) So prepared, she helped Ivey on his way to millions.
Ivey’s attorney Ed Jacobs emphasized that Hillman did not describe the poker player’s actions as fraud. “What this ruling says is a player is prohibited from combining his skill and intellect and visual acuity to beat the casino at its own game,” the lawyer said, according to the Associated Press. “The casino agreed to every single accommodation requested by Phil Ivey in his four visits because they were eager to try to win his money.” The gambler was only using observation, the defense went, and rotating the cards was within the rules of the game. Jacobs added Ivey will appeal the ruling.
As for the $250,000 worth of comped goods and services that Borgata gave to Ivey and Sun, Hillman concluded that they did not owe the casino restitution. “Because the ‘comps’ were not tied to an obligation that Ivey win or lose, or do anything in particular except to visit Borgata,” he wrote, “Borgata is not entitled to the return of the value of those ‘comps’ as part of its breach of contract damages.”
