If the New York justice system is anything like Texas’ (er …), we can expect it to take about a year before the people responsible for the killing of a low-stakes (but high-action) poker player in Arlington. Just this week, New York courts officially charged William Delvalle with the murder of Frank DeSena, who you may recall was the recreational poker player killed last November in the robbery of an underground poker club in midtown Manhattan.

Interesting to note that the courts aren’t even claiming Delvalle pulled the trigger — and yet he still faces life in prison for being the leader of the robbery/homicide. Interesting to me because the poker robbers in Dallas likewise face a similar fate. Sure, laws are different, state-to-state … but not by that much. And without a doubt, though no arrests have been made in any Dallas poker robberies and there’s no certain connection between the latest in Arlington and others around the DFW area that were very similar … poker players in Dallas have a pretty good idea about the identities of at least a few people who have may or may not have donned ski masks and wielded weapons to rape a poker room. (And no, I’m not taking about the police SWAT teams who have done that recently, too — that’s a different story altogether.)

When the Ashton got robbed, I was a little dismissive of the finger-pointing (it was a bad time to be a black Dallas rounder). But now, four or five robberies later — +1 dropped cellphone, +recurring player presences, +1 dead — the reality in this sub-subculture is becoming clearer. Not to mention that police have had their own inside players in games since at least 2006 … we know this for a fact, and even who some of those guys are, but probably not all … but regardless, point being that whether it’s a year from now or not, it’s only a matter of time before we see the poker crooks and the law come to showdown.

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Two masked men showed up at a poker game in a South Arlington apartment complex a week or so ago … they knocked on the door, one player got up to answer, and upon realizing that the game was about to be robbed, he struggled to shut the door. Commotion ensued as it became an inverse tug-of-war to see whether the robbers would be getting in or the poker players would be able to keep them out. After a few seconds of scuffle, shots rang out — eight, maybe 10 — at which point players and the dealer fled in the other direction, out a back door, jumping off the balcony. (Not sure if it was from the second or third floor — but three of them suffered minor injuries as a result.)

The player who originally got up from the table to answer the knock (”John” is all I know of his name right now) got hit by at least three bullets … one in the shoulder, one in the leg, and one somewhere else … and he died last night from blood-related complications to his wounds.

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The story of Jimmy Chagra’s life is a colorful one, to say the least. His early years included a heavy investment in the drug business, high-stakes gambling, which included poker with the likes of Doyle Brunson and Chip Reese, and crime.

It was the drug trade that seemed to make Jimmy’s word go ’round. By all accounts, he took his drug profits to the casinos and lost large sums of money at the poker and gaming tables, then made it all back with drugs - living on the edge in a whirlwind of activity that finally took him to prison. He plead guilty to charges of heading up an assassination attempt on the Assistant US Attorney in 1978, and he was alleged to have set up another hit - this one successful - on Judge Wood, the man who handed down his first prison sentence. The story gained great publicity because the hit man supposedly hired by Jimmy was Charles Harrelson, father of actor Woody Harrelson.

Jimmy’s prison stint was finally ended in 2003 for health reasons, and he was placed in the Federal Witness Protection Program. But living in hiding didn’t sit well with the notorious criminal/gambler because he showed up at the 2007 WSOP to play a little and conduct a few interviews.

His sister reported that Jimmy died on August 19 at the age of 63 after a battle with cancer.

Was there a poker robbery in Dallas last night — or perhaps talk around some tables about an old one?

Not trying to start anything, rumor or otherwise … I just happened to notice a few visitors coming to us via Google searches overnight for “dallas poker robbery”. Not to give my secrets away, but monitoring Google traffic isn’t too different from the way night-shift journos used to listen to police radios back in the newspaper day … and when I’ve noticed a quick surge in such searches before (or more commonly, “dallas poker room raided”) it usually meant something was up. But other than this “hunch” I’ve got nothing.

UPDATE: Yep … VFW hall that screams poker room was popped last night:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26065611

VIDEO: http://video.nbc5i.com/player/?id=283511

UPDATE: Oh, dude, I recognize exactly where this is! One of the best and biggest games kinda-sorta but not really in Dallas. Have played there a handful of times, and always enjoyed the action. Interestingly enough, both cops and robbers have been here before. This was the place where the guys who just might be the Dallas Poker Bandits got their start …

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Cuong in Texas writes in with some beefs about a casino poker room in Oklahoma:

I was hoping you could shed some light on the Terrible Competence of Choctaw Casino. First, they lie about the numbers at the Choctaw Open, then will not publish results in Card Player, Etc or Send any other results to Poker groups on there Large Tournaments. I have contacted Managers and was told they were busy???WTF..Winstar always takes care of this quickly. I need results listed so my Investor can verify numbers. I will never play other Tournament at Choctaw Casino again. Please write a story on Choctaw so I can get others stories. Thank you,

Thank you … Can you tell us a little more about the numbers they supposedly lied about?

I do indeed have a story about Choctaw that I sadly haven’t finished writing yet. The last time I was there, I ran into Black James and his crew, who were extra-friendly with the poker room management. They took their seats at a 1/2 table (unable to convince us to play 2/5) and proceeded to remove more than half the money from the table in 45 minutes by doing a hyper-bet-collusion hit-and-run. That was obvious to me, and I suspect but can’t prove there might have been a little more than collusion going on when James’ no-look bet got an all-in reraise from my pocket queens and he pretended to be shocked to discover he had pocket kings.

Not at all suggesting Choctaw was in on any unethical behavior, but poker room operators were watching the action, so if they weren’t part of it, then what does that say about their ability to notice/put a stop to cheating. (James McDaniel, of course, is now back in prison for a parole violation connected to the deaths of a police officer and SMU coed.)

Anyone else have any Choctaw stories?

In the meantime, Cuonger, below are the results for the 2008 Choctaw Open, held last month in Durant, sent in by a fellow Pokeratizen:
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photo: Jackie Endsley
Putting your last dollar toward a bad-beat jackpot may not have been the best career strategy for this guy.

Audio

I got a call yesterday at the WSOP from the Butler. I haven’t seen the guy for a couple months — not since me and my jiu-jitsu coach and heavy metal teacher got booted out of our sweet pad (pool table, poker table, dart board, 65-inch HDTV, Strip-view bedroom, fireplace/jacuzzi bathroom, no utilities) on the Eastside. We of course knew all was headed south when the Butler — the guy who set the whole housing arrangement up — walked into our casa unannounced to do a cocaine deal, and shortly thereafter got busted by The Boss (who owned the house, in theory, though not on paper) for stealing rent money.

(I met the Butler last year at the WSOP, as he was trying to sell his private concierge services to poker players and convince me to turn him into a recurring character on Pokerati.)

Anyhow, so I got a call from an unknown 973 number yesterday that I answered in the press box. “Hey, Dan, it’s John. Are you at the Series? How’s it going?”

“Um, uh, pretty good? We’re just getting rolling … so what’s up? Did you make it to Kansas City?”

“Yeah, and it’s not good. I’m calling because I need a stake.”

“Yeow, dude … can’t help you out. Wouldn’t know how to get you money if I could.”

“Western Union.”

“Sorry, man Have you tried Tom? His number is 602-97… .”

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