Here’s the complete criminal record of Barron Glenn Boutte, the poker robber shot and killed in Houston last week. A lot of marijuana charges and some evading arrests. Pretty petty thuggish. Not a surprise that robbing a poker room seemed to provide him an opportunity to step up into a bigger game. Ahh, the poker dream …

The only thing that stands out to me is that the dude was so short — 5’5″, 110 pounds. Probably just a coincidence, but in many of the DFW robberies that we attributed to the “Dallas Poker Bandits”, there was always one distinctly tall guy (6’4″ish), and one distinctly short guy (5’5″ish).

But Boutte definitely seemed to be a Houston thug, not a Dallas guy who moved to Harris County when the games up North dried up.

Click here for details on Barron Boutte’s poker robbery gone awry, and below for his pre-poker criminal record.

(Thanks Mrs. T for the research.)

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The story behind an underground game in Houston that broke with a flurry of bullets last week — resulting in one fatality and two others wounded — is starting to emerge. Filtering through braggadocio, legal ambiguities, and the inherent fuzziness of thirdhand sources, here’s what we definitely know, what we are hearing, and then some speculation about an “inside job”. And what this robbery may or may not have to do with similar ones in Houston, Dallas, Arlington, and San Antonio.

The dead robber’s name is Barron Glenn Boutte. (Anyone recognize the name?) He was a 24-year-old black male. The official cause of death is homicide/multiple gun shot wounds. It’s not clear where Barron was from, though one mention of him on the internet does suggest Houston.

From the Houston Police Department:

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In what really sounds like an inside job, three armed gunmen (two with masks) broke into a San Antonio home game a few days ago and robbed 15 low-stakes players (1/3 NLH) at gunpoint … but when they attempted to flee the scene, the SAPD was outside waiting to arrest them. Nice! I mean bad initially — the host’s wife, two young children and a baby were also in the house — but in the end all good with no shots fired and no need to call in the SWAT team.

(Note to non-poker media: do the math; $100-$200 per person isn’t “high stakes”.)

A firsthand account of the robbery/bust here. I’ll stay off my political soapbox for just a bit and say only wouldn’t it be nice if you could play poker in Texas at a place that can hire off-duty police officers for security? (Note to non-poker media: There’s a bill in the Legislature right now addressing this issue, fyi — HB 222 — that you may want to tie in to future stories of this ilk.)

From Vinnie the PastaTeke:

He kept repeating, “Don’t move; I’ll kill you, I don’t know you”. Maybe it’s just human nature, or maybe I watch too many movies but I couldn’t help but play over and over in my head the different things that could be done to overtake the guy with shotgun. Of course, I knew that this wasn’t smart because these guys were only there for the money and, besides, there were kids in the room. If someone tried to do something and it went wrong, one of the kids could have been hurt.

My first thought when I started reading (and before I knew the cops got’em) was wondering if these were indeed the Dallas Poker Bandits, perhaps just relocating their business because there was too much heat (and a homicide victim) in the DFW area. But the robbery sounds a little too amateur for Dallas’ now seasoned poker criminals. At the same time … there are some MO … so maybe? If you happen to be familiar with any of the Dallas poker robberies, take a look at the news videos here to see if you recognize any of the now un-masked men:

http://www.ksat.com/video/19198835/index.html
http://www.kens5.com/latestnews/stories/KENS20090416-GAMBLINGROBBERY.dd0e8f26.html

Kudos to the game host for dialing an operator and hiding his phone so the call could be forwarded to police — and nice work by the SAPD not just in ending this situation positively, but also for protecting other games … because as we have seen in Dallas, poker robbers tend not to quit after a single hit. I haven’t had a chance to get the police report yet and find out the arrested people’s names, but this story will continue to have life … not just because of the pending bill that would look to eliminate these sorts of potentially violent occurrences … but also because police are now investigating the legality of the game itself and may or may not press charges against the robbery victims as well.

One-time Pokerati contributor (and my hunting coach) Nick in Dallas writes in with a request for some charity theatrical poker tourney assistance:

Hey Dan,

So some friends and I are going to throw a poker tournament in February here in Dallas as a fundraiser for a theater production company that we started this fall (www.UpstartTheater.com). Blue Mesa Grill is going to host the games (free appetizers and happy-hour-priced drinks) and we are going to have a $20 per player donation buyin with rebuys. I was wondering if you had any advice/suggestions:

— How often should we up the blinds so that a game starting around 3 on a Sunday will be over by 8 or 9 at the latest?
— Do you know any poker company/group willing to lend/donate us enough chips and cards for 100 people or so?
— Do you know any poker company/group that would be interested in donating a prize?
— Do you know any poker company/group that would be interested in financially sponsoring the event (we’re tax deductible) in exchange for publicity on our event fliers, website, and performance playbills?
— Do you know ways to publicize this to the Dallas poker-playing community?
— Anything else you think would be helpful?

thanks a lot,
Nick

Nick, as always, good to hear from you. One of these days you will find purpose in your life and ditch the restaurant-service/medical-technology career combo, as well as your passion for the arts and philanthropy, to discover your true calling as a poker blogger. Either that, or you are clearly nothing without Markus and Andy.

In the meantime, click below for answers to your questions:

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Details are sketchy here in Las Vegas, but apparently it took place Friday night near TI (Texas Instruments) headquarters on the city-limit outskirts of northeast Dallas … Ironically enough, according to what we’re hearing, this longtime-running, near-legendary game had moved to another location nearby but recently relocated again, going solo when the partner venue wouldn’t pony up for security.

This robbery does not appear to be the work of the homicidally notorious Dallas Poker Bandits, unless they drastically changed their MO. The unconfirmed word spreading around D-town is that a dealer had stepped outside to smoke some pot, and when one of the owners went looking for him (good help is hard to find), a couple black males jumped out (of some bushes?) and began “throwing down” … the owner ran off … and as two or three others came out of the poker room to investigate what was going on, they too were robbed, at which point the assailants took off on foot.

Though Pokerati hasn’t yet talked with police for an official report, the cops were supposedly all over it with multiple patrol cars and a helicopter.

No specifics, btw, on the robber’s (or robbers’) weaponry.

I was just doing a little research earlier today on the status of the unsolved Arlington, TX, poker homicide. While I hadn’t come across anything new yet regarding pursuit of the killer(s), I had been hearing that all was calm and comfortable in the D-town underground. I was supposing this only made sense — as surely the poker bandits had learned the guy they shot died (sorry, I’m still working on getting the victim’s actual name) … and the one silver lining if you could find one in death is that it probably meant an end to their reign of poker havoc.

It had to just be too risky, robbing poker games in Dallas now … with a potential murder charge should they get caught. After all, the DPD has a pretty good idea who the gun-toting, ski-mask donning poker thugs are … rooms have been getting hit in similar fashions for about a year-and-a-half … or at least a short-list of primary suspects. And while that’s no guarantee that the string of robberies in Dallas is connected to the homicide at an Arlington apartment game … shit, even Pokerati knows of more similarities than just “two black guys” that would at least merit a look by law enforcement.

Or so I thought … From a Patrick the Pokerati commenter:

dan,

you hear about the same robbery bandits strike again. This time in an asian home game in Cedar Hill. Gated $500K homes community. Very bold. Same MO tall black and short black… guns.. police arrived just 2 mins too late…

Sigh … I had not heard about this, but now I have.

Not sure what to make of this — reliable sources, please feel free to share any info …

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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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Can someone give me confirmation that this game is done, as in out of commission? I gotta think it has to be with the TV cameras and everything on it. But you know … we have standards here, and don’t want to name it and/or give out specifics about the general vicinity until we know a little bit more.

UPDATE: Huh, wow … we are not going to name the game (yet) … because right, why would a regular Veterans club shut down after a robbery, right? Everything’s normal … nothing to see here. (And on a serious side, I may sound semi-mocking, but I haven’t forgotten that some of the people who work there are friends of mine whose livelihoods may or may not be in jeopardy.

An eye-witness guy who sat next to an eye-witness the next day put up his full report on Weston Poker. Am starting to think these aren’t the same Dallas Poker Bandits that robbed the Ashton, and then presumably The Office … but they do seem like the same guys who attempted to rob this room and failed (at least) once before. What went down late-late in the Wednesday a.m., shortly before sunrise, according to one second-hand source:

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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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There’s talk in the comments down below about poppin’ caps in the poker bandits. It’s a shame when your decisions about where to play factor an EV calculated as Expected Violence. (Fortunately most poker players I know are a bit too lazy to hunt down bad guys and show ’em who’s boss with a barrel, and the CHL holders steer clear of premeditated homicide — no matter how justifiable — for fear of losing their license.)

But still … guns were in play in last night’s robbery. Not just on the thugs who obviously come in not wanting to shoot anyone, but also on a player or three … At least one guy last night had a (legal) gun on him when being robbed. Afterwards, some apparently questioned his decision not to use it. The rub is that had he fired as robbers were kicking their way in through the wall, the ski-masked duo woulda turned right around and skeedaddled. True enough, but as liberal as Texas is when it comes to shooting people messin’ with your property, the nature of the venue might negate that defense. And what if it was the police?!? Yeow, shooting blindly at what may or may not be a SWAT team can never be good for a game. Hmm, Class C misdemeanor or Death Penalty … decisions decisions.

Clearly a good fold. In general I’d prefer loaded weapons to be in the hands of a rock more than a maniac.

A little more info coming in … one thing, it was way more than $10k stolen … as one of the players‘ watches taken cost that much. So our new estimate for damage is $20k. Probably a little more.

Another North Dallas poker room apparently just got robbed about two hours ago — the gunmen making off with more than $10,000 in cash, watches, cell phones, and at least one bracelet.

The 15/30 Omaha game had just broken a little after 10 pm central and a full 2/5 NLH table was going strong when players heard Smash! Crash! “What the fuck?!?” one player screamed.

“I know what that is,” another player answered as he ran toward the back room and others followed. It sounded like a police raid — we all remember how the cops busted through the walls at Jackie’s on semi-live TV — only this time it was robbers. Two armed black males wearing ski masks and hoodies came busting through glass windows and sheet rock to enter through the smoking room. Players looked for an escape in the seconds that followed, but there was no back door. This game – located in an office building near the Galleria – was relatively new … had been open just a few months … and seemed plenty secure with a two-door entry system monitored by cameras.

“Where’s the fucking money at?” the lead thug shouted as he emerged from the smoking room into the main area and made his way to the gace.

“There are a couple 50s beneath the drawer,” on of the room operators said.

Four or five players had crammed into a supply closet in the back room and locked the door behind them. Huddling together in the dark, they scrambled to find places to hide their wallets. One player had wedged his in some plastic wrap behind a stack of plates just a few seconds before the robbers realized there were people in there and ordered them out. They were told to lay on the ground with their faces to the floor – all complied – at which point the other robber frisked them one-by-one for their valuables while his accomplice made a quick check of the closet but apparently found none of the stashed goods.

The whole robbery lasted just a few minutes … as of last night, no decision had been made about whether or not to call the police, which you can suspect whoever is behind this latest string of poker robberies is partially banking on.

According to current forfeiture laws, when the Dallas cops raid a poker game, they generally get to keep whatever money they confiscate. However, assuming the DPD is operating all on the up-and-up, that money is supposed to be used for more poker busts …

In addition to what I was calling “Henser’s Game” (have since learned it might be “Gennser’s Game”), DC’s Poker House also got raided last week — Friday, I believe, about the same time as the robbery at the Ashton.

From a Pokerati citizen journalist on the ground:

Another game that got raided was DC’s POKER HO– USE in dallas off of shiloh & northwest highway. The cops single handedly busted that game because of money laundering. DC had about 40 slot machines in the building that caused his place to be shut down. I beleive what made DC’s place get so hot was when he pulled out a 9mm on one of the players who were getting a little out of hand.

Yikes, mix 8-Liners and 9-millimeters together and you kinda gotta expect some problems, no?

Also, maybe this is where the reports of a triple poker robicide came from … within a few days last week you had two busts and one robbery nearly simultaneously … and as we know in poker, it’s often difficult to distinguish between the two, because the action and results are usually pretty much the same.

UPDATE: Hmm, this is the second time that a robbery and police bust went down at two separate poker rooms nearly simultaneously. Strange coincidence? It’s possible that both sides make similar assessments when it comes to game selection — picking nights when they expect the most money to be in play.

Inverse Underground: Small private games in luxury high-rises such as The Ashton (above) seemed a safer alternative to strip malls and warehouses as gun-wielding cops/robbers began infiltrating Dallas poker action.

More info coming in about last week’s robbery of a Dallas game in Uptown. First, we have no indication of any synchronized Al Qaeda-type attacks … it appears to be a single robbery, committed by two black males … which has some people speculating that the perps were the same two black males that have been seen brandishing guns in at least one other poker robbery. Because you know, two black guys is very specific.

The poker venue that got robbed Friday night was known as “The Ashton,” after the building it was hosted in. There were actually two games there — a “little game” (2/5) during part of the week, and a bigger one less often that attracted pros and somtimes saw five-figure bricks of cash on the table. The robbers poked their 9mms in the door during the little game, which suggests that either they didn’t know that there was less money in play with more potential players/potential troublemakers, or they just were being less criminally greedy, thinking thousands of dollars stolen from many players would be nicer than taking 10s of thousands from just a few. With that said, the robbers left cash on the floor, so they musta been in a hurry, too.

Security was apparently the problem … dudes got lax, or at least comfortable. So much so that others involved in the game(s) reportedly had been complaining about security procedures to poker authorities at The Ashton, but no one really tightened up their game. The more details I give you here, the less certain I am of my accuracy, but one (theoretical) dealer supposedly lobbied successfully for hallway cameras, but they weren’t used very diligently. Hey, play too loose with a comfortable stack and its almost certain you’ll eventually lose it, right?

The Ashton’s non-poker management reportedly knew about the game(s) all along — I suspect they thought it was kinda cool to have a two-table poker speakeasy in their joint, especially one that paid the rent reliably — but have since asked their poker tenants to leave, who of course, being the good clean pokerers the are, are complying.

As the World Series has concluded and the new poker year begins, just like that we get a reminder of some real issues facing poker players in search of a good, honest game.

Details are sparse as they filter in to Las Vegas, but we’re hearing that a room in Northeast Dallas was robbed at about 1 am central. According to unconfirmed reports:

• Three men burst into a big Omaha game firing rifles and shotguns.
• One player hit, either from ricochet or shrapnel.
• Dallas police were called to the scene and responded.
• Local news crew in tow.
• Typical player here lived in Plano, Richardson, Frisco, or McKinney.

This has been at least the third armed robbery of a Dallas poker room in the past few months, fourth if you include the attempted pillaging where the gunmen were briefly locked in a lobby and a dealer tried to hide herself in a trash bag.