SharePoker pro Joshua Thatcher has been sentenced to 12 months’ probation after pleading guilty to running an illegal poker room in Marquette, Michigan...
Thatcher, who goes by the pseudonym the PLO Professor on his YouTube channel, opened the private poker club 906 Poker Social on April 1st, 2021.
By July 8th, however, its doors were shut after a joint investigation by the Michigan Department of Attorney General and Michigan Gaming Control Board Criminal Investigation section.
In May 2022 Thatcher was charged with six felony counts, including two counts of using computers to commit a crime, and a high misdemeanour count of permitting a gambling house for gain.
Although five of the charges were later dismissed, he agreed to plead guilty to one felony count of Gambling Operations. As part of his plea agreement, Thatcher agreed to give up all items seized from the poker club.
This included six poker tables, $13,050 in cash, as well as other money held in bank accounts connected to the 906 Poker Social investigation.
A press release from the Michigan Gaming Control Board executive director Henry Williams read: “Unregulated gambling operations do not offer Michigan residents the same protections provided through legal, regulated gambling.”
Williams added: “The Michigan Gaming Control Board’s mission is to ensure fair and honest gaming in Michigan, and we partner with the Michigan Department of Attorney General to investigate and eliminate illegal gaming activities across the state.”
The case was prosecuted by the Michigan Department of Attorney General’s office, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel stating: “My office remains committed to upholding business rules and regulations, and that includes our state’s gambling laws. I appreciate the work the Michigan Gaming Control Board has done to protect Michigan residents and businesses.”
Judge Jennifer A. Mazzuchi of the 25th Circuit Court in Marquette presided over sentencing.
The case mirrors those currently taking place in Texas, where the private membership version of poker rooms are seen as a way around the gaming regulations, or at least a grey area in the law, likely to soon be tested at state level.
Thatcher described how he charged members of the 906 Poker Social a fee based on weekly, monthly or yearly membership, plus a $10 per hour chair rental fee.
He explained to TV6: “It’s really unfortunate that the state of Michigan does not want people to create a safe and friendly and professional environment to play poker. That’s all I was trained to do.
Thatcher revealed: “I actually got permission from the Michigan Gaming Control Board… All I was trying to do was create a professional, safe environment to play cards. It’s really unfortunate because people are forced to play in Escanaba… or have a home game, which is not professional or safe.”
The decision to prosecute Thatcher also seems at odds with previous statements from the Michigan Gaming Control Board (MGCB) in which spokesperson Mary Kay Bean stated its authority did not expand to private clubs.
Bean told MI Bets, “The Michigan Gaming Control Board does not licence nor regulate private poker clubs. The agency licences and regulates poker through the commercial casinos and authorised online operators as well as charitable poker (known as millionaire parties).”
