Phil Ivey edge-sorting pal Cheng Yin Sun is one of three gamblers suing Foxwoods Casino Resort for over $3 million in withheld winnings. Although Ivey is not directly tangled up in the Foxwoods case, Sun and Ivey are both presently the main topic of a court case brought by the Borgata in Atlantic City, which is seeking to recover $9.6 million it paid out to the pair adhering to a stint during the mini-baccarat tables in 2012.

Both instances involve the use of edge-sorting, and also the debate over its legality, or absence thereof; issue that is fifty shades of grey, so far as what the law states is concerned. The Borgata states the practice is cheating and is illegal under state gaming law; Sun and Ivey state it is not.

Edge-sorting is a technique in which the gambler is actually able to look for the value of a card by observing subtle manufacturing flaws and asymmetries into the pattern on the back, and the skilled edge-sorter can turn the chances in their or her benefit to your tune of six or seven percent.

Is it cheating? Well, there is the sc rub, and now we’re likely to find down soon, due to the fact theories of both ongoing parties are tested in courts on both sides of the Atlantic. The gamblers declare that they’ve been making use of pure ability to caress the chances in their favor (and edge-sorting is no mean feat, requiring freakish abilities of observance), while the casinos are claiming it’s fraudulence, pure and easy.

$1.6 Million in Stakes Held Back

As well whilst the Foxwoods and Borgata cases, Ivey normally suing London’s Crockford’s Casino, that has withheld $12.1 million following Ivey and Sun’s visit here, also in 2012. The latest case makes no mention of Ivey, however, and is brought by Sun and two associates, Long Mei Fan and Zong Yang Li. The trio claims that the bad debts for them by Foxwoods comprises $1.1 million in winnings and their $1.6 million in stakes.

‘Basically, edge-sorting is possible because some brands of credit cards aren’t cut symmetrically across their backs and some players are gifted with eyesight keen sufficient to tell the distinction,’ says the suit. ‘If Foxwoods and Foxwoods management knew that plaintiffs were edge-sorting and let them exercise their as a type of advantage play anyway, intending to keep their losses when they won, this would be intentional fraud. when they lost however honor their winnings’

Unprecedented

The situations are fascinating because they’re entirely without precedent, as expert in gaming law Maurice VerStandig underlined recently.

‘Edge sorting falls someplace between card counting and weighted eyes that are snake and regulations is yet to figure out just where,’ he stated. ‘There is not any precedent that is real cases like this, and when the judicial system cannot find precedent, it goes in search of analogy, something that doesn’t much help here, either, because edge sorting is maybe not really analogous to anything…’

While Sun’s name differs on the court documents from the Foxwoods case to those of the Borgata, here spelled Cheung Yin Sun instead of Cheng Yin Sun, Marvin Vining, a lawyer representing the Foxwoods plaintiffs, has confirmed they are one and the exact same.

‘that Cheung can be confirmed by me Yin Sun was additionally Phil Ivey’s playing partner in mini-baccarat sessions that provided rise to the Borgata lawsuit in nj-new jersey while the Crockfords lawsuit in London,’ said Vining. ‘She used different partners that are playing Foxwoods, and the circumstances of most three lawsuits are slightly various. Nevertheless the Foxwoods plaintiffs did employ essentially the same variety of edge-sorting strategy as involved with the other two lawsuits.’