Californian Vinh Dao caught by New Jersey legalized poker sites, faking his location

We have long wondered what would happen to someone caught playing the legalized online poker sites from a different state.

Would their money just be forfeited? Would they be arrested?

Seems like we got our answer -- at least in New Jersey.

Vinh Dao, an unknown poker player from California, was playing on the New Jersey sites in 2014, and was caught. He had $92,000 in his various accounts, and was allowed to keep $2500 of it in exchange for "cooperation" and agreement to forfeit the funds.

It is possible that the $2500 was returned in exchange for him explaining how he did it.

There was no talk of prosecuting him criminally.

Here's the documents from the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement: https://2e0bs62so1hlnpqst3vja2p1-wpe...ornia-case.pdf

Here's Haley Hintze's flushdraw article: http://www.flushdraw.net/news/califo...w-jersey-play/

While this is a 2014 matter, note that the NJ DGE document is dated January 2019, as it apparently took this long to come to this decision and agreement. Prior to that, the matter was under seal and unknown to the public.

Despite the fact that the $90k was won from other poker players, it is not being returned to them. The respective online casinos are keeping it, which shouldn't be allowed, but apparently is -- at least in New Jersey.

Pretty solid recap. One correction: The DGE, and not the casinos, kept the money.

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Originally Posted by haleylh

Pretty solid recap. One correction: The DGE, and not the casinos, kept the money.

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LOL, you gotta be fucking kidding me...any rationale provided on this being part of the law or is it, 'we be fucking broke since PA opened up gaming so we need all the help we can get'?

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Originally Posted by GambleBotsChafedPenis

Quote:

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Originally Posted by haleylh

Pretty solid recap. One correction: The DGE, and not the casinos, kept the money.

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LOL, you gotta be fucking kidding me...any rationale provided on this being part of the law or is it, 'we be fucking broke since PA opened up gaming so we need all the help we can get'?

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By law Casinos are never allowed to keep any money forfeited by a player. It always goes to the DGE. It's messed up that the players aren't getting anything back, but having the funds go to the state rather than the casino makes sense as they don't want to give incentive to the casino to seize player funds. (which is a big issue with unregulated sites)

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Originally Posted by haleylh

Pretty solid recap. One correction: The DGE, and not the casinos, kept the money.

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One thing to note:

Together, the Borgata and CIE turned over $90,113.94 in funds that had been frozen for some time. That consisted of $79,539.24 from Dao’s account at BorgataCasino.com (which may have been transferred over at some point from BorgataPoker.com) and $10,574.70 from Dao’s New Jersey WSOP.com account.

BorgataCasino and BorgataPoker are essentially the same account. No transfer would be necessary. If you have $100 in your account you can sit with $50 at a cash game and buyin for $50 at a BJ table.