In 2012, poker legend Phil Ivey won almost $10 million in total at the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa during four separate visits. In April 2014, the Borgata sued him for cheating to get that money back. Ivey spoke out to proclaim his innocence, but now he and his legal time are formally striking back.
To recap, Ivey called the Borgata in April 2012 in advance of trip there to arrange a special high stakes baccarat game. He asked for, and was given, the following concessions: a private gaming area, a dealer who spoke Mandarin Chinese, an eight-deck shoe of purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards, an automatic card shuffler, and permission to have a guest sitting with him at the table. The Borgata agreed, set the maximum bet at $50,000, and required Ivey to deposit $1,000,000 with the casino in advance.
The Borgata alleges in its lawsuit that Ivey had claimed that the reason for his requests was superstition when in reality he planned to cheat. The casino is accusing him of edge-sorting. It says that Ivey and his gaming companion, Cheng Yin Sun, knew of defects in the way those specific purple Gemaco cards were cut, turning their normal symmetrical card backs into asymmetrical patterns. The Borgata alleges that when a card that was key in the game of baccarat was played, Ivey and Sun asked the dealer to rotate it 180 degrees. This was important because with the asymmetrical miscut card backs, Ivey and Sun were allegedly able to tell which cards had been rotated, even when face down. The automatic shuffler did not change the orientation of the cards, so they were still allegedly able to spot a key card when it was the first to come off the shoe. Being able to tell with some degree of accuracy what the first card was going to be gave Ivey a huge advantage over the house.
The Borgata sued Ivey for a number of things including Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing, Breach of Contract, and Fraud.
In a motion to dismiss filed last week, Ivey’s attorneys argued against the validity of the lawsuit on three fronts. First and foremost, they said that he did not cheat. They said that the simple act of looking at the cards, not handling them or manipulating them in any way, makes his play no different than anyone else’s. The Borgata is trying to cover its ass, trying to freeroll Ivey:
…the use of nothing more than his eyesight and his reliance upon information that was equally available to every single casino customer, in no way equates with the [action and wrongful intent] required to accomplish any of the multiple criminal statutes upon which plaintiff relies. After recruiting, enticing and providing defendant Ivey with the precise gambling environment it agreed to, Borgata seeks to take it all back because Ivey say precisely what anyone what anyone [sic] of its pit supervisors or employees apparently should have seen over the course of more than 100 hours of play. Complaint is therefore nothing more than an attempt to justify its own negligence, motivated by its subjective intent to take as much money from Phil Ivey as it could during his specially arranged and agreed visits.
Second, even if Ivey did cheat, the casino cannot come at him. Violations of gaming regulations are within the purview of the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement; it is that government entity that can seek legal action, not he Borgata. And third, even if Ivey did cheat, the statute of limitations was only six months and has long expired.
Ivey won his tenth World Series of Poker bracelet this summer and is currently one of the chip leaders in the Main Event after Day 1 action.
