Categories: Poker News
| Published On Sep 27, 2013 7:00 am CEST  |  Updated on May 2, 2021 11:58 am CEST | By iGaming Team

Italian sentenced to prison for poker scam

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A clever and ingeneous scam at a Cannes casino has ended up with the perpetrator sentenced to spend two years behind bars. The scammer apparently used infra-red contact lenses to keep track of decks of cards that had been marked with invisible ink. The scam is more than likely the first of its kind in Europe.

According to a court hearing on how the events unfolded, the Italian man had purchased the set of infra-red lenses for €2000 from China. He then had some of his contacts within the casino hand him over decks of cards which he then proceeded to mark in special invisble ink, re-wrap in Cellophane and send back to the casino where they were used in regular game play. He managed to follow and keep track of the game before participating in it and winning up to €70,000 without being caught.

Even though casino security employees were suspicious they were not able to do anything except contact police and initiate an investigation. After wire-tapping the telephone of the scammer, police had enough evidence to lock him up for 2 years and slap a hefty fine on him.