Casino-Cheat Insurance???!!!

Casino Cheat Insurance?

I've been around the casino cheating world for more than 40 years, and I thought I either knew or heard of everything that had to do with cheating. But that thought disappeared during a conversation I had with a very, and I mean very knowledgeable casino surveillance director. It proved as well that you're never too old or too experienced to learn something new...even if you are an "expert."

We were talking about a significant baccarat scam that happened a few years back. The cheats had partnered with crooked dealers who were marking the cards so the cheats could know in advance what first-card the PLAYERS hand would receive. They eventually got caught and the scam ended up in court, where the dealers, who'd confessed and cooperated with prosecutors, were convicted via plea bargains, while a jury acquitted the cheats.

And then the surveillance director said to me, "But it wasn't so bad for the casino because they had cheat insurance."

I said, "They had what?"

He repeated it, and after I expressed my disbelief and confusion, he reaffirmed that the victim-casino did indeed have cheat insurance, meaning that they were covered by an insurance company up to a certain amount (a large amount at that) for losses sustained from cheats cheating their gaming tables.

I couldn't believe my ears!

I knew casinos had blackjack "insurance." But casino-cheat insurance?

You mean casinos actually take out insurance to cover casino-cheating losses???

Then I cracked a joke, maybe just to cover my ignorance. I said, "So why then are casinos so worried about being cheated if they have insurance to cover their cheat losses? Why do they bother with all this game protection then?"

Then I thought half-heartedly, "Well maybe if they got hit too much by cheats and filed too many casino-cheating claims, their policy rates would go up too much." LOL

This lighthearted moment reminded me of a famous line once uttered by baseball Hall of Fame great Mickey Mantle, who said, "Had I known I was gonna live this long, I woulda taken better care of myself."

I chuckled and then said to myself Mickey-Mantle-like, "Had I known casinos had casino-cheat insurance to cover their cheat-losses, maybe I should have cheated them out of more money during my 25-year career cheating casinos. I mean, maybe they would have cared less while I cheated them out of more...

I can just gleefully imagine the following situation:

I do a monster multi-thousand-dollar cheat move and the dealer is suspicious. He notifies the supervisor, who is in turn suspicious and notifies the shift boss, who is in turn suspicious and notifies surveillance, who run back the video and confirm the cheat move to the shift boss, who immediately notifies the casino manager expecting a swift reaction to bust me, but instead receives a shrug of the casino manager's shoulders with an "Ah, forget about it...we have cheat insurance here, didn't you know that?"

And when the shift boss gives him a befuddled look, the casino manager adds, "Just let Marcus cash out his cheat winnings. Let some other casino that doesn't have cheat-insurance deal with him,"

Just joking! Please don't take it or me seriously!!