The Golden Nugget is Suing a Bunch of Gamblers Who Cashed in on an Unshuffled Deck for $1.5 Million
Newser – So you failed to unshuffle the deck—why is that our problem? That’s essentially what a group of 14 gamblers are arguing in an effort to retain $1.5 million they won at an Atlantic City casino in 2012, the AP reports. They filed a motion yesterday in an attempt to persuade a judge to reverse her ruling favoring the casino. Back in 2012, these gamblers were playing mini-baccarat at the Golden Nugget when they realized the card decks were unshuffled (the manufacturer had failed to pre-shuffle them). So the players increased their bets from $10 to $5,000 and won 41 hands in a row. The casino only let them cash out $558,900, and sued to get back that amount and legally retain the rest, Consumerist reports.
To no one’s surprise, the attorney for the casino’s parent company supports the judge’s February ruling: “The trial judge considered the law and made a very thoughtful and correct decision,” he tells the AP. “We see no reason why she would change her mind.” The judge hasn’t indicated how she’ll decide, but the players say her ruling could upset other gamblers: “By ordering the patrons to return the monies that were paid out by (the Golden Nugget) nearly three years after the game ended sends incredible conditional messages to the public: A win isn’t necessarily a win,” they say in the filing. Meanwhile, Atlantic City is suffering hard times: Four casinos closed last year and the city itself may face bankruptcy over plummeting tax revenues, Reuters reports.
Classic double standard. I guess I’m not allowed to ask the casino to give me back all the money I lose when they ply me with alcohol and encourage me to bet the side bet on the blackjack tables. But they forget to shuffle a deck and a couple of degenerates cash in and all of a sudden court orders are flying all over the place? I can’t believe they even won the initial lawsuit. Is this judge taking crazy pills? How are you gonna tell these people to give back a bunch of money they won fair and square?
How do you even play Baccarat anyways? Honestly, I didn’t even think it was a real card game. Just something they used in old James Bond movies and in Archer. Every movie / TV scene I’ve ever seen with Baccarat always involves people betting enormous quantities of money. The dealer gives them two cards and that’s basically the whole dealing and betting procedure. Everybody’s in a tuxedo but the game looks about as complicated as Clark Griswold trying to win at War in the off strip casino. The dealer yells “tooty le fruity” or “banque” or Benoit (balls) or something which somehow means that somebody has a better hand than somebody else. Then whoever has the best hand gets like a million dollars for having what looks to me like a pair of twos. Game makes 0 sense. And guess what? It clearly doesn’t make any sense to the dealer, the pit boss, and the floor manager who were at the Golden Nugget the night they lost $1.5 mil either. Otherwise they wouldn’t have sat there dealing sequential cars for 41 FUCKING HANDS before they pulled the plug on these poor bastards.
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P.S. What are the odds of 14 people who were playing $10 bets at mini-Baccarat at an Atlantic City casino still having the $500k the casino paid out two years ago? Like 100,000,000:1?