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State Files Complaint Over Pensacola Greyhound Track Card Games
August 29, 2017
State gambling regulators have filed filed complaints alleging that Pensacola Greyhound Racing failed to comply with requirements for “designated player games”.
The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation filed the administrative complaint.
The games, in which a player acts as the “bank,” were at the center of a legal battle between the state and the Seminole Tribe. The battle focused on whether the wildly popular — and lucrative — games violated the tribal casinos’ “exclusive” rights to offer banked card games such as blackjack.
Scott and the Seminoles reached an agreement this summer after U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle ruled in favor of the tribe.
In the July agreement, the state agreed to drop its appeal of the federal court decision and to take “aggressive enforcement action” against pari-mutuels that might be violating state law in the way they conduct designated-player games. State law requires players to “play against each other,” as opposed to playing against the “house,” which operates as a “bank.”
The agreement with the tribe also freed up $200 million in payments to the state, something lawmakers were eager to tap into, even though the deal took legislative leaders by surprise.
The complaint alleges that the Pensacola cardroom is operating a casino-type game, in which players are playing against a bank instead of each other.
Barry Richard, a lawyer who represents the Seminoles, said he met with Department of Business and Professional Regulation officials last week to discuss the settlement agreement.
“They informed us that they wanted us to know that they’ve already begun to enforce the law as Judge Hinkle interpreted,” Richard said in a telephone interview. “We have a high level of confidence they appear to be conscientiously and in good faith abiding by the settlement agreement and by Judge Hinkle’s decision.”
The settlement agreement focused on a portion of a 20-year gambling deal, called a “compact,” that expired in 2015. That portion of the deal gave exclusive rights to tribal casinos to operate banked card games, such as blackjack.
Under the 2010 deal, the tribe guaranteed $1 billion in payments to the state for the exclusive rights to offer the banked card games for five years.
The tribe sued the state when the agreement expired, accusing state gambling officials of breaching the compact by allowing improper designated-player games at horse and dog tracks and jai alai frontons.
Under Florida law, a “banking game” is defined as one “in which the house is a participant in the game, taking on players, paying winners, and collecting from losers or in which the cardroom establishes a bank against which participants play.”
Lawyers for the state argued that a player acting as the bank does not establish a bank within the meaning of the statute.
But Hinkle rejected that, writing that the second part of the definition describes a game banked by anyone, including a player.
“The essential feature of a ‘banked’ game is this: The bank pays the winners and collects from the losers,” he wrote.
In the November order, Hinkle focused in part on one cardroom’s requirement that potential designated players pass a background check and post a cash bond of $100,000 to act as the bank.
“The assertion that this game was just players competing against one another, without a ‘bank’ established by the facility, should have been a nonstarter. But the department assured the cardroom in writing that the game was compliant with Florida law. The assurance provided a ’safe harbor,’ protecting the facility from prosecution for conducting an illegal banked game,” Hinkle wrote.
The recent complaints did not specifically outline how the Pensacola games were illegal, but indicated that the “designated player” did not change, something referenced in Hinkle’s ruling.
The Pensacola Greyhound Track is owned by the Poarch Creek Indians of Atmore. A similar complaint has been filed against the Sarasota Kennel Club.
by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida with contributions by NorthEscambia.com
Comments
3 Responses to “State Files Complaint Over Pensacola Greyhound Track Card Games”
I agree. The house seems to “always” win at black jack. I wouldn’t mind a little 5 card draw.
No one’s arm is Twisted to go to these establishments to be robbed they do it willingly.
The three card poker banked game at the Pensacola Greyhound is the worst odds game you could find in any American Casino. It is a license to steal as people wait to play poker. Three card poker has set odds across American Casinos which are thrown out the window to insure the person who banks the game is an automatic winner all the time. They should shut it down, or at least have the Florida gaming commission have consistent odds on games which they allow in Florida. Somehow Florida just has to allow corruption and back room deals to cheat Florida residents.