Top 10 famous gamblers who beat casinos

Gamblers walk in to the casinos and most of them think they will make huge money tonight . Well, most of them lose their money as all the casino games are designed with high payouts; suffice to attract their visitors but a large house edge that always give casinos an upper hand. Some casino games depend on luck while there are some games that are beatable, game of skill. They know they will make money every time they sit on the table. Only few gamblers have been able to do that and I am going to introduce you to the top 10 best players and teams who have beat the system.

10.Ron harris

Ronald Dale Harris was a programmer who seeks the hole in the online gambling while working for Nevada State Gambling. He took advantage of his skills and stole thousands of dollars from the Las Vegas casinos through slot machines. Casinos were oblivious to his scams and he had his fortune.

He shifted his intelligence to the probability game Keno. He developed a program through which he would know which numbers are going to be selected by RNG (Random Number Generator). There are 1 to million odds of what his accomplice Reid Errol McNeal did at the Bally’s Casino in the Atlantic City of New Jersey by hitting a huge jackpot of $100K. It made officials suspicious of him as he does not show any sign of excitement. McNeal was investigated which led them to the Harris and was sentenced for 7 years. He was released after 2 years and is restricted from entering into casinos.

9. Gonzalo Garcia-Pelayo

He was a director, producer but somehow did not succeed in this profession. He become attracted toward Roulette and become the first person ever to develop a Roulette Strategy. Instead, it was said by Albert Einstein that there is no way to beat roulette.

Gamblers believe that there are bias wheels but they all fail to make money through this method. Bias wheel means there is more probability of generating more numbers by a wheel than the others. It is due to some mechanical defect in the wheel like off level and the rotation which cause certain numbers to come every time.

He took his method in a casino of Spain. He recorded the results of a specific wheel and analyzes them with his computer. He went on to record his results for more than 1000 spins and took help of his children to analyze the results. Before he bet a penny, he had sufficed knowledge to bet on particular numbers. Most of the time, he won and began to feel the rush. He spotted a new casino and repeated the whole process again.

When he got famous among casinos, he took his method to Las Vegas where the money soars up. When casinos commence to know him, he took retirement with a total profit of more than $1.5 Million. One of the casinos sued him for their losses but the result was in his favor as the Supreme Court proclaims all he did was analysis. There is no scam. This is it.

8. Dominic LoRiggio

He was the master when it comes to Blackjack and Craps. He practiced for days and did what most people would still believe is impossible.

He learned “controlled shooting” in games of craps. He rolls the dice by holding them together and pulling them back while releasing them in the air which would land at the back of the table very smoothly. He practices this technique countless times and soon becomes perfect in it. He forms a team known as “Rosebut” that took the Las Vegas casinos first. Dominic was names as “Dominator” because of his skills.
He quit the team because he was not satisfied with the amount and then went on to make huge bucks. He joined one of the famous gamblers of that era “Frank Scoblete” and won huge money in various casinos of various cities. He has not done anything illegal as controlled shooting is not a crime. He was never caught for anything and now takes Dice Rolling classes. The man with the Golden Arm was quoted many times and he gently said “I have done this with simple physics”.

7. Keith Taft

He was the electronics genius. Together with his son, he created the first digital microcomputer to capture a digital image. He spend almost 30 years to build this device.
In 1969, he got fascinated by Edward Throp who proclaimed that game of BlackJack is beatable. He tried very hard and did not succeed. Then he realized he would make a microcomputer to shuffle the house edge in his favor.

His first invention was a fifteen pound computer for card counting controlled by his toes and hid under his shirt. He was healthy and makes some advancement which reduces the weight and named it David. He made more than $400K in the first seven days.

He did a blunder and launched his computer for deceiving casinos to people and trained him. He was caught by the casino officials but they did not know how that things work. Fortunate for him they were not able to prove anything and let him go.

Their next discovery was not plausible for anyone. The father and son team developed a tiny video camera which can be easily worn under the belt which can see the dealer’s hole card. The camera would give signal to the partner who would be near the range and tell him the best possible move. This is not it; they have made Thor and Naina which can track positioning of cards.

The rule changed, and it becomes illegal to take any electronic device inside the casinos. However, this was way after they have made money.

6. Ida Summers

She was way too attractive. Ida made moves and had all the male attention to her. She makes move right in front of their eyes and all were too oblivious to notice that.

She had specialization in two things, “Hand Mucking” in which a card was removed from the table while play in progress to affect the house edge and switching in which she switches cards from the table. She becomes famous as The Vegas Vixen.

In spite of her beauty she was extrovert, flirtatious which make switching cards too easy. She started with the hand mucking at first and then stepped to switching in “Coolers”. She even put losing hand to make it realistic. As you cannot win every hand, it would make your surrounding suspicious no matter how much gorgeous you are.

Card switching is considered to be gallant because the card has to be physically moved from the table at exact time when cooler is split in to spot. The whole process takes a blink of an eye. She managed to do that by holding the shoe in her lap and pass it to her accomplice.

They caught her and all accomplices and were astound with her skills and looks. She is the only female who succeeds in deceiving casinos.

5. Tommy Glenn Carmichael

Started his cheating career in the 1980’ when he was 30 years old, his expertise was in slot machines. Like Taft, he was also a talented inventor.

Tommy met Ray, his old friend in Las Vegas who had a slot machine in his truck when he met him. Tommy began experimenting on that one. His first discovery was device of metal. If it is inserted into slot machine, they would produce payouts but soon after it, most of the casinos started to replace old slot with the new ones. He has to move to small halls and got arrested. He was imprisoned for 5 years but that did not affect him and he started working on his devices as soon as he got out of jail.

He met Balsamo inside the jail and both decided to take casinos together. Tommy face problem with the new technology slot machine which had microprocessor and micro controller based program that produce Random Number Generator build by IGT (International Game Technology). Tommy purchased an IGT slot machine.

He invented a slider (Monkey Paw) made from the strings of Guitar and steel. He insert the slider into the machine to trip the switch which would let coins to flow from the machine while the bucks are held in the quarter section.

Again his invention got outdated with casinos again replacing slots with better technologies in 1991. He bought the new machine from a manufacturer and invented light wand. He began selling it to other gamblers, though it was not a surety in the long run.

He was arrested again by FBI in 1996 for using wand in slot machines but he was exonerated. He was arrested twice in the next three years and in 2001 he was sentenced for 7 years. Later he helped casinos to improve their system holes and made it almost impossible to trick slot machines.

4. Louis Colavecchio

He was popular with the name “The Coin”. He made numerous slot machine coins of various casinos with the hardened steel. He grabs attention when casinos began to notice surplus of coins.The Secret Service, FBI and all other agencies searched his house in the 1990’s where they seek thousand of slot coins manufactured for Atlantic and Connecticut casinos.

He duplicated the coins exactly the same as real coins and it was very hard to differentiate between the real and the fake ones. He had all the instruments to make perfect “coins”. Metals like Zinc, Copper and Nickel with laser to cut them in perfect round shape and finish it with the stamp on the coins and press it with the heavy press from Italy.

He was genius at his work that his coins were bought by the authorities to a casino Louis had hit and did not had slightest of idea they were fake. Before coming into eyes of officials he went to Las Vegas and did the same. Officials were suspicious of him when he showed up with huge surplus amount and their skepticism was confirmed when they check coins.

It took FBI more than a week to know how much forgery he has already done after they caught him. Many Las Vegas casinos denied they had been scammed just by coins. It was estimated he had made between $100K to $500K. Later he helped them to avoid the same crime in future.

3. MIT Blackjack Team

They are my favorite and the most famous of all the gambling cheats ever made. They were a group of students of MIT, Harvard and other top schools who took Blackjack strategy to the new level. They specialized in card counting and made small group all around casino states from 1979 to early 21st century.

It was an activity where students meet after the school in a classroom during the mid 1990’s. They all were brilliant at card counting.They form their group of students and professors who even made a recruiting campaign around campus. Students have to take test and at last a very few make their way in the team.

It was not new, there were many card counters before who shift the house edge in their favor but this team took card counting to a new level. They had one motto “We are not gambling, do card counting and never get caught”. They enter in the casinos through a team pretending they do not know each other in disguises with the players give other player indication of hot tables. Their complex way had made it very difficult for authorities to be suspicious of him.

Each player has to play its role, gone through rigorous training and making it perfect without raising suspicion. They make methods that would match the real life conditions. They use simple words as code words. When they knew everything is going to work as they thought, they made their corporation Strategic Investments. Their revenue exceeded far more their goal with making more than $400K in single weekend.

They came into notice when they have to move small casinos. They went to Europe so their reputation. The players who made the team quit. Even though new players joined the team but their era was vanished when all know about MIT students. Casinos make their database from high school yearbook which completely ended their time.The team made more than $5,000,000 within five years and become legends when it comes to deceiving casinos.

Till then and now, many movies have been Made over them like The Last Casino, a group of 3 students and a professor and the most famous 21 in which a team made by blackjack expert professor who went on to “City of Angles” and the rest is history.

2.Richard Marcus

He was bribed for gambling as a child to flip baseball cards by other children. He was unaware that he was cheated by his schoolmates and it did not take long since he lost his entire collection.

He began to betting on horses, play poker, and other stuff like that. Gambling became his passion. He bought a mustang of his own which he drove to Las Vegas to seek his luck.

He was not old enough to commence gambling in casinos and was living in the streets of Vegas in hot summer. He finds a job in casino which deals mainly in Baccarat and Blackjack.He met Classon who was a professional gambler who fell on Richard’s Table. They decided to meet after his work. Classon challenged him to come up with the idea to make him win. He made a shuffled deck which was set in such a way in the shoe that the player will win. They forged $21,000 which was a very huge amount.
He succeeded in tricking Four Queen Casino and made his way in Classon team which consists of professional gamblers Jerry Palmer, Duke Swenson and Joe. He was trained by them on various methods of Baccarat, Blackjack, Roulette and Craps.

He becomes master of pastposted bets and works with the same team for 12 years. The most fascinating discovery was of “Mix Up” where officials were made to believe the player won the bet by luck while it is a pastposting move.

His moves made him elite than others. He named his move “The Savannah” at Roulette. Suppose there are four $10 chips resting on column, as soon as the player will win he will show excitement, yelling and jumping on his foot and grabbing attention of surroundings. The dealer would be confused as why player is happy as he has is not won huge amount. Then, the player would make him realize there is a $500 chip at the bottom of the stack of four $10 chips.

If the bet result in a loss, he would remove the last chip of four chips and he would only lose $15. It was a brilliant scam as all will believe it was luck. The low amount chips are used to cover the high amount chips and dealer will know about it when the player wants. The method was not new and many have performed it but Richard has taken it to new level. Other gamblers would bet small and add chips if they won but Richard reverse the whole process. He bet huge and then cut to small if he lose. It did not raise suspicion as officials have their eyes on the winning, not on the losses. At some point Richard and his team were dropping $5K chips under $500 chips.

He was caught but made more than $5 million already before it. He still claims on his website than he trick casinos in a way they can never get their hand on him.

1.Edward Thorp

He was the first person who developed the card counting technique applied in real life and made people believe that the blackjack system is beatable. Being a math professor and holding masters in physics, he was genius in probability and correlation theorems.

He met his friend Claude Shannon in 60’s. Till then he was completely oblivious to the gambling. Shannon bought him to the Las Vegas and Blackjack got his attention. He played this game many times and seek that the game is mathematically beatable.

He scrutinizes every fact of the game in an organized manner. He uses IBM 704 computer and even learned FORTRAN to improve his equations. The computer was huge and it was so big, suffice to cover an entire room but still less efficient than today’s laptops.
He calculated variations of this game after certain hands were dealt. He learned the cards of low rank are more beneficial to the dealer and if they released from the deck, house edge shifted to player and worth to bet more on them. If high rank cards left the deck, the dealer has more advantage over the player and less money should be bet on them.

They went to casinos and there was only one result, Thorp and Shannon pockets were filled with thousands of dollars. They make $700K in a weekend. The term card counting was not even there and the officials had no clue what was happening. He was always winning and the casino had to admit he was cheating. He watched his videotapes again and again but could not able to figure out his theft. He was asking to leave by some casinos just because they know he would win.

He wrote one of the most famous books on Blackjack till date “Beat the Dealer” which was a great hit in 1962. He wrote another edition in 1966 which discussed about minute variations of the game.

The book and the popularity of the game work in the favor of casinos as hundreds of gamblers try to pull the technique on tables but were not successful at it. His technique was taken by MIT students who made a huge success. He was a math genius and switches his interest in stock market and makes huge money from there. He was inductee in Blackjack hall of Fame.