Card Counting Before the Indiana Supreme Court
An Indiana casino is asking the state's Supreme Court to reverse a decision that casinos in that state may not ban card counters from blackjack tables. In Donovan v. Grand Victoria Casino & Resort, L.P., No. 49102-0903-CV-259 (Ind. Ct. App., Oct. 30, 2009), the Indiana Court of Appeals rejected the casino's claim that it had a common law right to exclude a patron "for any reason or no reason."
Thomas Donovan estimates that he won about $6,000 a year counting cards in blackjack games in Midwestern casinos. When he was excluded from the Grand Victoria Casino in Rising Sun, Ind., he sued, arguing that the casino did not have the power to keep him out.
In a unanimous ruling, the appellate court largely applied the reasoning of Uston v. Resorts Int'l Hotel, Inc., 89 N.J. 163 (1982), which concerned the pioneering card counter Ken Uston. Both decisions turn on two propositions.
First, both courts held that casinos do not fully possess the rights held by most private businesses to exclude any patron whom they do not wish to serve (except if such refusal is based on racial or gender discrimination). The Indiana court explained that since Indiana has imposed pervasive regulation over the games played in casinos, the state eliminated any common law right the casinos might claim to exclude patrons "based on strategy employed" by the gambler.
Second, neither Indiana nor New Jersey gaming regulators had adopted a specific rule prohibiting card counting by blackjack players. Consequently, Donovan was complying with all existing rules for blackjack games and could not be excluded from the casino.
The Indiana Supreme Court will decide in January whether to review the decision.
