Decoding Casino Secrets: Unraveling the Truth About Dealers and Cheating
Cheating at cards is not as hard or as uncommon as you might think, especially if the dealer is in on it. For the purpose of this post, we’ll focus on dealer cheating and not the many ways that a dishonest player might cheat on her own. It’s always fun to use female pronoun when one is expecting a “him” or a “he.”
Of course, the dealer effectively decides who gets which cards. This makes the dealer, who is in a position of extreme trust, the frequent nexus of cheating schemes. A player would be able to, maybe, substitute a card or gain some other advantage. The dealer has the whole deck to work with.
Exposing Cheating Dealers in the Casino World
Dealer cheating is not at all uncommon. Radio Station 99.3 FM in Aurora, Indiana reported on May 9, 2019 that a casino dealer was accused of cheating at Blackjack and Poker in order to give select players an advantage. The dealer was evidently arrested and charged with Cheating at a Gambling Game – a level 6 felony.
Casino.org reported on March 14, 2019 that a New Hampshire casino leveled charges relating to a dealer dealing off the bottom of the deck to an associate in a stud poker game at the casino. Making matters morally worse, the club is a licensed charitable gaming operation where a portion of the play goes to charity. Thus, if charges are proven, the dealer was also hurting a charitable cause. At this writing, I can’t find more on the resolution of these charges.
Cheating at cards is not limited to poker and blackjack. Apparently cheating is possible even when the cards are dealt from a shoe. Casino.org reported on December 6, 2019 that a Maryland casino dealer was sentenced to 18 months in jail and ordered to make restitution to his employer after somehow alerting baccarat players as to the order of the cards to be dealt out of the shoe. Prosecutors claimed this allowed the man and any accomplices to cheat the casino out of over $1 million.
Here are more cases of alleged dealer cheating, cheating and more cheating. So much dealer cheating! These are all alleged crimes that made it to the news because a casino or card club was involved. What about all the instances of dealer cheating in private games? Given the increased level of supervision at a club or casino, it boggles the mind to consider how often dealer cheating occurs outside of established gaming businesses.
When one thinks about the most basic function of a dealer, it is to randomize the cards. So, aside from scams like casino dealers paying accomplices too much in certain games without a pot or signaling what the next card will be, dealer cheat methods are most often about sending favorable cards to a certain player that the dealer is in league with. In a home game, the cheating dealer may have no accomplices and just be helping herself.
There are so many ways this can happen. Most often they involve shuffles that aren’t really randomizing the cards, but instead engineering cards into position for cheating. This often involves keeping certain select cards at the top or bottom of the deck. One of the few ways to check this is to watch closely and see if the top or bottom cards are really changing from shuffle to shuffle. For instance, if the same cards are always still on top or bottom after a shuffle. Of course, with so many types of shuffles, spotting this is more difficult than it sounds. Shuffle types include the: Overhand shuffle; Table Riffle shuffle; Hindu shuffle; Pile shuffle; Corgi shuffle, Mongean shuffle; and the Weave & Faro shuffles. These different types of shuffles are often used in combination during a series of shuffles. The two most common shuffles are overhand shuffles and riffle shuffles. Here’s a good overview of the kind of shuffling sequence you’re more likely to see in casinos.
If you still think spotting cards that remain in the same place during a shuffle is easy, check out this video. Keep in mind that the camera is in the most optimal position possible to spot cheating. A player trying to spot this from three players away would be at a distinct disadvantage.
Strategies for Beating Cheating in Casinos
So, what can we say for sure? We can say that the more handling of the cards a dealer does, the more opportunity there is for the dealer, if dishonest, to engineer select cards into position for cheating. Therefore, the very best solution is purely mechanical shuffling. It removes the vast majority of opportunity for the dishonest dealer to manipulate cards into position. It also eliminiates the opportunity for a player glimpse a card’s position in the deck during shuffling.
Sure, a dishonest dealer could still deal from the bottom of the deck, but if the cards come out of a shuffling machine and are immediately handed to a player to cut, the opportunity for the dealer to engineer a favorable card to the bottom or top of the deck is almost eliminated.
By the way, most people won’t notice a skilled dealer putting the cards back the way they were after a player cuts the cards, but that’s a whole other issue. If the cards were entirely shuffled by machine, there would be no value in circumventing the player’s cut of the cards.
So, to answer the original question, “do casinos cheat?” In this writer’s opinion and in regard to poker, the answer is “no.” The problem is, and this is where the effect for you the player is involved, losing money to the dealer’s associate is just as bad as the casino itself trying to cheat… losing is losing. After all, the house itself shouldn’t care who wins at poker, just as long as money is won and lost. For more actionable information on how to spot card cheats, at a home game, club or casino, fill out the form below and we’ll send it along.