Poker Run? No Chance

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http://www.newsobserver.com/722/story/572243.html

Poker Run? No Chance

By Jim Nesbitt, Staff Writer, News and Observer

For their first big fundraiser in eight years, David Bench and the Cary Crime Stoppers thought they had a sure-fire gimmick: a classic motorcycle poker run.

Instead, they found themselves on the verge of violating the law to raise money to fight crime.

Poker is illegal in North Carolina, as underscored last week by an N.C. Court of Appeals ruling. Even charity games violate the state's broadly worded gambling statutes, although law enforcement officials and district attorneys rarely shut down the action of a legitimate group raising money for a good cause.

Under state law, playing or running any game of chance is a Class 2 misdemeanor, unless there's an exemption, as there is for the N.C. Education Lottery or charity bingo and raffles. Poker isn't exempted; nor is the game's motorcycle derivative, a no-skill game of chance in which bikers pay an entry fee and ride to five locations, drawing a card at each stop.

At the end of the run, the biker with the top poker hand claims the top prize. For the Cary Crime Stoppers event May 19, that would be $250 in cash; the rest of the pot would line the coffers of the nonprofit, which gives cash rewards to people who call in crime tips.

But Cary Crime Stoppers faced a second problem of the public relations variety. In late March, Cary police raided a several-nights-a-week poker game run out of a warehouse, arresting at least 41.

The raid was based on a tip filed with Cary Crime Stoppers, said Bench, a retired Nortel employee who took the helm of the nonprofit in 2004. The mass arrest angered Triangle poker aficionados, who say their favorite card game should be legal because they think it is a contest of skill rather than chance.

And once they learned about Cary Crime Stoppers' poker run, they lit up local poker blogs to complain about the apparent hypocrisy.

"We got bit by our own anti-crime," Bench said. "The poker players in the area kind of got up wagging their fingers at us. If Cary police had not made that raid, we probably would have gotten away with it."

In preparing for the raid, Cary police Capt. Dave Wulff said he discovered the poker run was illegal.

"You have to be concerned about public perception, but you really need to make sure you're doing the right thing," said Wulff, whose wife, Linda, is one of four corporate sponsors of the Crime Stoppers event.

When Cary police contacted his office, Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby said, his assistants told police the prosecutor doesn't go after charity poker games or gambling events.

They also passed along a bit of advice.

"On the heels of arresting somebody in a poker raid, it was probably bad public relations," Willoughby said. "That might affect their ability to raise money."

So, Bench said, Cary Crime Stoppers decided to drop the poker run concept.

They'll still hold the charity motorcycle ride May 19. Instead of cards, they'll give each biker raffle tickets at each stop -- then hold a drawing. Charity raffles are a legal exemption of state gambling laws.

That leaves only one small problem, Bench said. About 100 custom-made pins that will be given to riders were ordered before the switch and still bear the words poker run.

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