Eight mega-high rollers arrived in style at the ritzy Borgata Casino during the first week of June this summer. They were all packing, loaded to the gills with cartridges of cash, and ready to attack the high-stakes Texas Hold'em games spread across the floor of the Borgata's giant Poker room. The plan was to fatten up their bankrolls and then invade the tables at Atlantic City's richest Poker tournament, the Borgata Summer Open, which was to begin in two weeks. The championship event boasted a $5,000 entry fee and a cool half-million to the winner. And there would be even more lucrative side games running parallel to the tournament.
Yet the most lucrative game of all was high above the Borgata's Poker room, its existence made known by two classy grifters who carefully selected these eight high rollers as their victims. One by one, the grifters spread word of a super-high-stakes cash game taking place in a penthouse suite. The game was open to those select players who had both the requisite bankroll—at least $500,000 cash—and the good sense to keep their mouths shut; after all, high-stakes Poker is legal on the casino floor but not in the accommodating hotel rooms above it.
The eight high rollers could not resist. There was nothing better than an organized high-stakes private game where there was no rake to pay the casino. Plus there was the ability for each high roller to do whatever he liked between hands—without the scrutiny of casino regulations. For some, that may have meant a quick indulgence, a boost of narcotic energy or a visit from a high-priced call girl to relieve the tension. The suite was certainly large enough to satisfy each of their whims. But the greatest allure of the private game was privacy itself. No onlookers. No curious eyes. No eyes that were more than curious, those set into the faces of lurking criminals looking to remove the high rollers from their cash or those of IRS agents looking to do the same in the name of the U.S. government. The bane of high-stakes cash play is the federal currency law that requires the reporting of any cash transaction of $10,000 or more to the IRS. There is also its sister law that requires the same report for the same amount of cash carried into or out of the United States. Players in the public eye are prone to this detection, but if they win millions in cash in a private game, both the IRS and potential thieves are kept safely in the dark.
Although the eight high rollers were quite familiar with luxury hotel suites, they must have noticed that this one at the Borgata was bathed in opulence. Extremely large, it was the plushest of the plush, used only for super-high rollers. Baroque double doors opened to a marbled foyer underneath a garish chandelier. Magnificent leather and teak furnishings regally graced the beige velvet carpeting. The walls sported artwork encased in gold frames. The living room beyond boasted a regulation pool table, a Steinway piano and a movie-screen TV with a built-in, state-of-the-art sound system. And a very ordinary green-baized Poker table with 11 chairs.
Naturally, the eight players invited to the game had some curiosities to be satisfied before venturing into play: Who had set this up? Who was paying for the suite? They were told that the casino had supplied everything on the house; the suite had been given to high-rolling friends with million-dollar credit lines in the main casino. Nothing was more believable in the big-time casino world. The game itself had been going on and off for weeks, the eight were told, but several of its players had busted out and gone broke. A new influx of cash was needed. The newcomers were glad to oblige.
Another added sweetener to the private game was room service. The high rollers could order whatever they wanted whenever they wanted it. During the course of play, everything from pineapple boats to lobster tails and bottles of Cristal champagne arrived with the chime of the suite's majestic doorbell. They poured the sparkling wine into Lalique crystal glasses and toasted and sipped between hands. One player even enjoyed a champagne bubble bath with a pair of lovelies who came to the suite during a break.
Everything was running according to plan. But like an international spy operation, not everyone was privy to that plan. In this case, it was the eight high rollers who were left in the cold, ignorant to what the other two players in the game were well aware of. Embedded in the room's four walls, camouflaged by artwork and strategic lighting, were tiny cameras with lenses that zoomed in on the players' hands as they picked up their hole cards. More often than not, the unsuspecting victims exposed them. They felt comfortable, as there were no "peeping Toms" watching the action the way they did downstairs. Even though the three rotating dealers hired for the game were legit, the cards they dealt were not. The Tens, Jacks, Queens, Kings and Aces were marked. The two crooked players wore special contact lenses that allowed them to see the markings. And even if the eight intended victims suspected any of this in their wildest dreams, they would have had trouble imagining what was going on next door.
Next door was not a fancy suite. It was a regular hotel room, but large enough to house the equipment needed by the other two cohorts, both high-tech geeks, to pull off the biggest Poker scam of all time. They huddled like cops working a stakeout in a van, surrounded by their high-tech arsenal. They had five laptop computers. On four of the screens appeared images of the players' hole cards, each screen taking the feed from a camera shifting between two hands at the Poker table next door. The fifth computer ran automated simulation programs adapted to Poker probability. (As if peeking at the hole cards wasn't enough!)
The techies' fingers scrambled over their keyboards, processing information they then transmitted back to their two cohorts at the Poker table, who wore tiny, undetectable earpieces. They could increase their advantage by reading marked cards when the techies could not furnish all their opponents' hole cards. They also used key "team-up" playing strategies when they had to, careful not to overdo it as they already had a huge advantage going in.
The four grifters had everything going their way. It was the perfect scam. The dealer dealt another round. While their opponents at the table carefully peeked at their hole cards, the two cheats at the table paid close attention to the soft voice in their ears. They listened to the methodical report of the eight players' hole cards, even the ones that had been tossed in the muck, as that knowledge was still valuable information. It came across like the recital of stock quotes: "Position One, Ace-King; Position Two, pocket Threes; Position Three..." They processed the information quickly, added the marked cards that flashed in their eyes, and then made their decisions. They played loosely, as they could afford to. They knew that the more hands they played, the quicker they'd get the suckers' money.
Within hours, the two cheats were ahead $50,000. The stakes had started at $300/$600 and rose to $500/$1,000 after an hour, then to $1,000/$2,000 after two hours. The thieves had the money to cover it but, more importantly, so did their marks. All eight were packing large. Each had $100,000 cash on hand and hundreds of thousands more in safe deposit boxes in their hotel rooms or at the casino cage. A few had already made trips to fetch more cash. The grifters had told their marks that they had the suite at their disposal for the entire summer, which would have been true if they needed it. But it was expensive; they were secretly paying $3,000 per night to set up their marks in its lavish confines.
They did not have the whole summer to burn on these unlucky pigeons. The victims would run out of money and leave Atlantic City without ever seeing the tournament. But what did the grifters care? There would be plenty more well-heeled suckers to take their places. If enough of them continued hitting the beachside gambling town, they would stay there all summer, maybe even into the fall. Who knew? All they did know was that this was their big score, the one that made hustling their entire lifetimes worth it. For the mastermind of the scam it was the ultimate risk; he was the most well-known and respected anti-cheating consultant to the entire casino industry. Casinos worldwide had been paying him tens of thousands of dollars to teach them how to thwart cheaters. This guy wrote the books. He even authored a chapter on how people could protect themselves in high-stakes private games—talk about the ultimate betrayal.
So it had to be worth it. They would all get rich and then retire to a velvety white beach somewhere. Maybe Rio. Maybe Tahiti. Wherever. It would all be over and there would be no regrets—just bags of cash under the sun. And if they ever got too lavish and spent too much of their booty, there was always another palatial suite waiting for them at another hotel staging a major Poker tournament. There was always the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, always more big action and always more suckers.
But something unforeseen was about to happen that would bring the scam to a sudden and jarring halt. However, no sign of the end was yet evident at the Poker table inside the posh suite. In fact, at the very moment the scam was about to meet its demise, one of the scammers was in the process of raking in a huge pot. Sweeping piles of gold-flecked $500 chips and $5,000 packets of cash, the winner gave his cohort a surreptitious glance with a barely perceptible smile.
In the room next door, the second pair of scammers smiled deliciously as they watched their cohort on the screen stack the regal chips and packets of cash into a towering fortress on the table in front of him. But suddenly their smiles disappeared as they registered the click of a key card opening the lock to their room from the corridor. It took them a second or two to comprehend, and in the next second they realized with desperate relief that they had bolted the security lock shut. There was no way anyone could come crashing through the door.
But that's exactly what happened. The security lock collapsed under the prying of a special tool. In poured a dozen New Jersey state police officers and Borgata security men, some with guns drawn. Before the first wave entered the room and got a gander at all the electronic equipment in the midst of filming and transmitting, the security lock on the suiteÕs double doors gave way, and into the living room crashed a dozen more cops and guards waving their guns. The high-tech cheating quartet was busted. They hadn't realized that one of their marks was not really a mark at all. Yes, he was a Poker player and had plans to enter the Borgata's Summer Open tournament, but he had also recognized the mastermind of the scam and knew he'd been busted in that same casino town two decades earlier. His crime that time had been switching in a "cooler" on a Blackjack game, which meant switching in a shoe filled with prearranged cards to take off the casino. The dealer had been in on that scam and testified. The mastermind ended up doing a two-month stint in the slam, then managed to turn his misfortune into a successful career as the world's numero-uno anti-cheating casino consultant. He has since conducted numerous seminars for casino surveillance executives eager for his teachings on how to protect their casinos from cheaters and thieves.
The scam made headlines all over the world, and its ingredients were described with flashy accolades worthy of James Bond and Billy Ocean.
The only difference is that Bond and Ocean got away with it.
The alleged mastermind's name is Steve Forte, and I am quite aware of his reputation as a top anti-cheating casino consultant. I was certainly shocked to learn that he had been accused of being at the helm of this ultra high-tech Poker scam. Forte claims that he was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, and until otherwise proven, I think we should all give him the benefit of the doubt.
Marcus is the author of four books: American Roulette, Dirty Poker, The World's Greatest Gambling Scams, and Identity Theft, Inc. He now serves as a casino game protection consultant. He can be reached at richard[at]richardmarcusbooks.com.
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