Asia leading the way in the forgery of gaming assets



Arrested in June 2005 in the largest casino in Spain, Casino Gran Madrid, were a couple of Chinese nationals who were caught red handed with 40 forged gaming chips of 250 Euro, value totalling 10,000 Euros, while attempting to play them on the simple chances on roulette. Police said at the time that they may have been part of a much larger organisation.



Not long after this in September of the same year, in one of the… Continue

Simple tricks





In the last year of the old millennium a large group of Armenians swept across Europe’s casinos with the simplest of tricks which made them hundreds of thousands. In countries from the far East of Europe to the tip of Spain they managed to confuse casino management and surveillance departments or in some cases the lack of surveillance departments. Operating as far North as Scandinavia, the word was spread throughout security circles, that here was a group… Continue

The dealer was being ridiculed.



On opening the mini baccarat table at the beginning of his shift, the dealer was being ridiculed by the rest of the gaming staff, as he had just dropped the shoe and six decks of cards which spilled onto the floor. As punishment the pit boss made him to pick everything up alone and sort out the cards for the start of play. The manager whose responsibility it was to start the video recording at the start of the gaming day had formed a habit of doing… Continue

Cheating an age old problem. 05/11/2008.



I was wandering through an antique book shop in Budapest, when I came across a book written in English entitled “Monte Carlo Anecdotes and Systems of Play”, by the author of “Ten Days at Monte Carlo at the Bank´s Expense”. The book was first published in 1901 by William Heinemann and written by B.V. just the initials were submitted by the author as he obviously wished to remain anonymous. In that period it was still a taboo subject to… Continue

City of cheats (like father like son). 01/Oct/2008



The city of Casale Monferrato in Northern Italy is infamous for housing the largest population of roulette pastposters or poussettisti as they are known (taken from the French word) poussette, whose derivative means to push. In a 2006 dragnet sweep code named “ Rien ne va plus” involving police officers from four different regions Novara, Alessandria, Turin and headed by the flying squad of Venice, seventeen arrests were made… Continue

When Big Brother was watched by surveillance. 02/Sept/08.



In April 1999 “Big Brother”, who is the leader of the organized Asian baccarat cheat team, which is the scourge of many casinos World-wide, had brought his team to Budapest.

On entering the city they walked into one of the neighbouring casinos, which had a Baccarat (Punto Banco) table. This table didn´t usually get much action and particularly in the afternoons but the management scrambled a team together and quickly got… Continue

My introduction to the M.I.T. team manager, “give Blackjack another chance”.

06/05/08.

In 1994, I was working as Gaming Manager at one of the most well known casinos in Central Europe. I had just come on duty for the night shift at around 8:30. A player and his girlfriend had arrived during the afternoon and presented themselves to the General Manager. The player a young American had singled out our casino because it was one of the few in the city with a hotel attached to it. He told… Continue

The Importance of having Audio (European wheel) .

31/July/2008.





Not so long ago I was invited by the Director of Security and Surveillance of one of the largest Casinos near the Italian border, to assist in the unmasking of a scam involving a roulette table game inspector and one of the guests. The reason I was asked to help in this case was because of my previous experiences in this type of action and because of my knowledge of the Italian language.

Here was a case… Continue

Who is watching the watchers?

03/July/08.



This was the subject matter of a question and answer session at the “World Game Protection” conference, which was held in February this year in the Paris Casino, Las Vegas.

A recent case in Atlantic City, where the surveillance department was found guilty for their staff ogling customers, instead of watching what they are supposed to watch, is an example of what may go on inside some CCTV operations. Where the staff, unlike all the… Continue

Tactics of the Organised Italian cheat team. 1 June 2008





It’s almost sixteen years ago to the day, that I assisted in the opening of possibly the most well know casino in what is today called Central Europe. We didn’t even know ourselves what the opening day was to be but they knew, they were waiting. They probably amused themselves in the existing casinos while they waited or dropped in to some local poker schools. We had a soft opening, I remember it was a Tuesday but we… Continue