Please forgive me if someone already posted this. If so I missed it. This was posted on a bulletin board I monitor.

Kerry

June 08, 1999Three arrested in Sam's Town poker scam
A dealer and two players have been arrested for allegedly
slipping in a "cold deck" to win a $44,000 "bad-beat" poker
jackpot at Sam's Town hotel-casino.
The arrests last month were made after security personnel
reviewed video surveillance cameras monitoring games in the
Boulder Highway casino's poker room. The tapes were reviewed
when a player sustained a "bad beat" in one of the games.
Officials at Sam's Town and its parent company, Boyd Gaming
Corp., declined to comment, so details of the specific handweren't available.
The Sam's Town poker room is one of many Las Vegas that
cater to local poker players. Some offer progressive "bad-beat"
jackpots in specific live games.
In a typical scenario, a player holding aces full or better whose
hand loses to four of a kind or better gets 45-50 percent of the
jackpot. The player whose hand beats the jackpot winner gets
about 25 percent, while the other players in the game split the
remainder of the jackpot.
The jackpot is funded by a special "rake," or money collected
from each pot, and climbs until the jackpot is hit. The prize then
reverts to a smaller amount that grows until the jackpot is hitagain.
The Sun has learned the tapes apparently revealed one of the
players who participated in the suspect jackpot game brought in
a "cold deck," or one in which the cards had been pre-arranged
to deal out specific hands, including two that would qualify forthe jackpot.
The player secreted the deck in a portion of the poker room,
where it was recovered by the dealer and slipped in as a
substitute for one of the normal decks in the game.
In the Sam's Town incident, the jackpot winner was paid about
half the $44,000, while the player with the best hand got about$11,000.
When the incident was discovered, Sam's Town officials
reinstated the $44,000 jackpot.
State Gaming Control Board officials filed cheating at gambling,
conspiracy to cheat at gambling and burglary charges against
dealer Gordon James Graves, 45, and players Charles Sanzeri,
51, and Andrew John DiVecchio, 41.
A Control Board official said the agency will make additionalarrests.
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All contents copyright 1999 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.