Poker Players Fight To Change Outdated Poker Law in South Carolina

The State of South Carolina has seriously been eradicating home poker by investigating games and raiding them with the force that is usually utilized for drug busts. The law that is being used to prosecute players that are arrested on these raids has been in existence since 1802 and really forbids from playing any type of card game in the residence of players.

The latest raid happened on April 28th, 2008, when the police department concluded a ten month investigation of an ongoing poker game in Charleston County where about four residences were surveillance by the police department. The police department raided one of the homes where the high-stakes poker gaming were taking place. The police officers have arrested twenty-seven people, confiscated $62,000 and shipped everyone to prison, where they were officially booked, forcing everyone to post bail to avoid getting locked up.

About sixty-five players who were arrested while playing on any of the homes that were surveillance by the police officers were charged and about nineteen of the players have pled guilty to the charged. The nineteen players were required to pay fines starting from $154 to $257 and will have to file a petition before the civil court for the return of the money that were sequestered by the police officers.

Bob Chimento was one of the poker players who was charged by the police officers even though he is not actually playing on one of the high-stakes games because the minimum were too high and he cannot he afford it. But he admits that he did play a game at one of the homes that was surveillance by the police department on October 15th, 2008 and includes an undercover police officer so he was included in the arrest warrant.

Chimento is now at forefront of fighting to get the outdated law changed because it is very unfair for those people that only want to play poker at the privacy of their own homes and that most people in the state do not favor the tactics of the police officers. The issue prompted state representative Wallace Scarborough to propose a bill that would give permission to people to play poker in their own homes as long as a rake is not collected in the game.

May 19, 2008
John Tucker