It was a turbulent year for poker professional Phil Ivey, and he spent the greater part of it off the live tournament felt. The player had to deal with two lawsuits related to him using a controversial technique while playing baccarat at two different casinos to improve his edge against the house. However, court dealings did not went in his best favour.
Ivey has been locked in the two legal battles for several years now. The player has been sued by Atlantic City’s Borgata Casino Hotel & Spa for winning $9.6 million while playing baccarat at said casino with fellow player Cheng Yin Sun. He has also been suing Crockfords Casino in Mayfair for not being paid £7.8 million he won by playing punto banco (a baccarat variant) at the London-based casino. Ivey and his companion player used edge sorting while playing at both casinos.
Court rulings on both cases stated that the edge sorting technique was not one that should be used at casinos and that the two players had violated the rules of the gambling venues by using it. In general, the technique allows players to take advantage of discrepancies on the backs of playing cards to improve their odds against the house.
As mentioned above, Ivey and Sun had won $9.6 million at the Borgata and £7.8 million at Crockfords Casino. The Borgata paid the two players their winnings before finding out that they had used edge sorting. Later on, the Atlantic City-based gambling venue filed a lawsuit against Ivey and Sun that spanned over three years.
Earlier this month, a US District Judge ordered that Ivey should return the amount of $10.1 million to the Borgata. As in previous court rulings, the judge said that the player and his companion had not committed fraud by using the edge sorting technique, but had violated the state Casino Control Act as well as their contract with the gambling venue that hosted the baccarat games.
Ivey also lost his case against Crockfords Casino after several years of court-battling with the gambling venue over £7.8 million in punto banco winnings he had been refused to be paid. Unlike the Borgata case, Crockfords Casino had not released the player’s winnings, arguing that he had used edge sorting to win the money. Here it is important to note that Ivey and Sun have never denied the use of said practice but have claimed that it was nothing close to fraud as it required certain skills to be exploited.
Thus, Ivey is set to end a non-poker year with two lost cases that have denied him to retain millions in winnings. It is not that the player has disappeared completely from the poker radars, he was spotted playing cash games at Bellagio in Las Vegas, but as far as his live tournament participation goes, he has cashed in just one tournament this year – the WPT National Philippines $200,000 Triton Super High Roller that took place in January. The player finished 5th in the event, collecting $656,500.
- Author
Harry Evans
