I’ve often wondered that, if you could somehow get poker chips that looked close enough to the real thing, would you be able to cash them in? Of course I would never try something like this as it’s just something I’ve pondered. But I did get my answer today after reading a news story out of a Fort Wayne, Indiana newspaper.
The article was about a 39 year-old man named Derrick Watts who passed fake poker chips at a place called the Parnell Poker Place. According to law enforcement officials, he did this from March 11th to March 30th and was able to make over $18,000 with the scam. If you do the math that’s almost $1,000 a day!
Of course Watts, being the good Samaritan that he is, said he only intended to keep around $200 for every $1,000 that he cashed out in chips. So when you factor Watts’ generosity into the equation, he was actually only making $3,600 over the 19 day span where he was cashing the fake chips in.
Still though, that’s a lot of money to be made from scheming on a small poker venue. And having been to Fort Wayne many times over the year, I can guarantee that the Parnell Poker Place isn’t very large since I’ve never even heard of it. And I can only imagine the hit they were taking when Watts was hustling them with his fake poker chips.
I guess some good did come out of this story though because I learned that my little thought about how difficult it would be to con a casino or cardroom with fake poker chips is a terrible idea!