SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
Poker legend Phil Ivey has relaunched legal proceedings against Genting Casino’s Crockfords Club Mayfair property seeking to reclaim £7.7 of winnings plus legal costs.
Ivey’s original dispute with the casino stretches back to 2012 when the American poker player won vast sums of money playing Punto Barco, a form of Baccarat.
At the time Ivey used a card reading technique known as ‘edge sorting’, to gain an advantage on the casino dealers.
Crockfords Club deemed Ivey’s play to be against its house rules and refused to pay his winnings, the casino would simply return Ivey’s £1 million wagered.
In 2014, Ivey sued Crockfords Club in a UK landmark trail with his representatives stating that edge sorting was no form of cheating and that the casino still held an advantage on the odds of the game.
However, a UK Civil Court ruled against Ivey’s defence, stating that his strategy had ‘Circumvented the premise of the game and therefore was not liable for the ‘winnings’.
Ivey would seek to overturn the decision, filing the lawsuit with the Supreme Court, taking his case to the highest court of appeal for UK law. Last November Ivey won the right for his lawsuit to be reviewed by the Supreme Court.
The court case will see Ivey represented by Richard Spearman QC, who argues that his client had ‘no legitimate advantage’ on the game of Punto Barco, and did not cheat in the fundamentals of how the game is played.
What is Edge Sorting
