A group of gamblers who allegedly used underhanded tactics to cheat the Hard Rock Casino in Northern Indiana out of hundreds of thousands of dollars may have done the same in other states. According to charges filed on June 2, they pulled off similar scams at more than 10 casinos across the country.
The Times of Northwest Indiana reported that the six people managed to scam over $700,000 from the Hard Rock Casino in just under a week in 2023 using Baccarat. That’s a big chunk of the total $1.5 million they’re accused of stealing from casinos in five other states between July 2023 and March 2024, based on court records from Lake Criminal Court.
Suspects accused of being part of Baccarat scam
The six people facing charges are Jianchu Liu, Fuxiang Liu, Qingyong Zhang, Honghui Wu, Daiqi Wang and Yuhan Hu. Each of them is charged with felony theft and cheating at gambling. Warrants for their arrest have already been issued, according to online court records.
Their scam centered around Baccarat, a casino table game that uses eight decks of cards. In Baccarat, each player and the “banker” (usually a casino staff member) are dealt two cards, and the hand that comes closest to a total of nine wins. Players can place their bets on the player’s hand, the banker’s hand or a tie.
Before the game begins, the dealer usually lets a player cut the deck using a special cut card. The cards are then placed in a device called a “shoe,” which holds the rest of the deck. According to the affidavit, that’s where the cheating began.
One of the group members would handle the cards in a way that violated casino rules. Sometimes they would fan or riffle through the cards, or even shift the shoe to get a glimpse of the card faces.
On several occasions, one of the suspects is said to have recorded the cards using a phone hidden under a pack of cigarettes. Surveillance footage reportedly shows another person using a Baccarat scorecard to block the view of security cameras while this was happening.
Once the video was captured, one of the group members would take the phone and cigarette pack and leave the table. Investigators believe they’d review the footage in a bathroom or outside the casino.
Armed with the knowledge of upcoming card combinations, they’d come back to the table and place massive bets. In some cases, two of the players would each bet between $10,000 and $20,000 toward the end of the round, which understandably raised eyebrows among the casino staff.
The group moved between different Baccarat tables until they found dealers who, unknowingly, allowed them to manipulate the cards. At one point, investigators thought a dealer might be in on it. But after interviewing him, they determined he wasn’t aware of what was happening.
He had only been working at the Hard Rock Casino for about a year and had just recently learned that he’d been accidentally exposing the cards during gameplay. Phone records also confirmed that he hadn’t communicated with any of the suspects.
Similar schemes in other states
Illinois gaming agents reported that the same group had previously run a similar scheme at Bally’s Casino in Chicago. They were banned from the property less than a month after it opened.
Casinos in other states, including Mississippi, New York, Pennsylvania and California, also reported being hit by the same group, losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in the process.
ReadWrite has reached out to Lake County Court for further information.
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