Cheats: Separating fact from fiction

By Mark Lasser

If you’ve ever watched a movie about gambling, there was probably a character that was a cheat. “The Sting” is all about an elaborate horse racing scam. There’s the backroom scene in “Casino” where a blackjack cheat has his hand broken with a hammer. Ed Norton in “Rounders” is what we call a mechanic, someone good at physically manipulating cards. Paul Newman in “The Hustler” is a pool con artist. There’s team of card counters in “21.” The list goes on.

So it begs the question, are there cheaters in casinos, home games, pool halls, etc? The answer is yes, but not very often and not to the dramatic extent you’ve seen in movies.

The chance of finding a cheater in a casino is darn close to zero. Home games, online games and unregulated games are a different story. Casinos depend on their integrity to keep guests as repeat customers. It’s very bad for business for them to cheat or be cheated. Long ago, there were vulnerabilities in the casino, but like a game of cat and mouse, the casinos and the cheats react and make advances.

For example, craps cheats used to be able to introduce loaded dice into games that increased the likelihood of rolling sevens. Then the casino made the dice clear making it impossible to load them with lead. They also routinely check dice for balance and mix them with other dice to make it hard to keep two loaded dice in a cheat’s hand. Some craps players try to slide instead of roll the dice. While a craps dealer may allow this to happen once, he’ll instruct the roller to get the dice in the air and to the other end of the table to ensure a good tumble.

Blackjack can be truly cheated by few methods, most of which hurt the house and not the other players. Cheats can try to switch cards or increase/decrease chips after the dealer makes or busts a hand, but this will be seen by security and any decent dealer. Anyone who plays the game is also aware that there are card counters. This is technically not cheating as it’s not illegal to memorize or keep track of cards and play to one’s best advantage as long as one isn’t employing a mechanical or electronic device. That said, casinos can, and will ask players they think are card counting, to play any game in the casino they like except blackjack or risk expulsion from the building. The casinos also now shuffle cards more frequently, making card counting less effective.

Poker cheaters are depicted as both bad and good guys in movies. We’ve seen it all from cards up someone’s sleeve, to decks stacked (pre-ordered) to deliver a predetermined outcome. Professional card rooms are now almost universally employing card-shuffling machines. Decks are routinely switched between tables and examined by managers. It’s darn near impossible to get away with marking cards, stacking decks, dealing seconds (dealer leaves top card and deals the second card in the deck), bottom dealing (same as second dealing except bottom card is moved instead of top card in the deck), or any other mechanical manipulations.

The biggest risk to players is collusion; basically, other players at the table working together and somehow signaling what they have. Cheats have done this in the past by stacking chips in certain orders or in certain places on the table, by betting unconventional amounts, by speaking in code, by tapping code with two chips and by just telling each other what they have. The card room manager is trained to spot some of these behaviors and egregious methods. Experienced players would also notice some of this and call attention to it. English is the only language allowed at tables by players during a hand and that prevents direct communication between some players. Collusion is much more likely online where players can be on the phone with each other or instant messaging. I’ve suspected this a few times and brought it to the attention of the security department.

Home games are another matter altogether. Of course, if you play in a regular game with people you trust, then cheating isn’t a concern. However, if you play in an unlicensed card room or are invited to play with strangers, you should be very careful. It takes a very skilled eye to notice marked cards. This is where you also might find real card mechanics at work. Don’t think that just because you’re winning, the game is on the up and up. Good cheats know you have to win first to feel comfortable before they hit you with a big take down. If in doubt, get up and leave. Even better, stick with licensed, professional games.

So what do you do if you suspect you are being cheated? Easy. Stop playing that game. If it’s a home game, just cash out and go home. If it’s in a casino, politely notify the pit boss or manager and ask them to keep an eye on what you deem suspicious behavior. They’ll likely call security to look at tape as well. The truth is a casino is about the safest place you could ever gamble and there are big teams of people working to keep it that way.

Have a story of being cheated or ever seen one in progress? Share it with me and we might write about it in a future column.

Mark B. Lasser is Denver writer and international poker player. He regularly plays in Colorado, Arizona, California, Missouri and Nevada. You can hear him talk about gambling and casinos every Friday at 5 p.m. on KEZW AM 1430. Readers can send questions and comments to him at ColoradoPokerMark@comcast.net.