Judge: Poker Is Still Illegal In WisconsinPoker Players Unsuccessful In Challenging Law |
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Though poker is widespread in Wisconsin, a judge has ruled that the game is illegal in the state if it’s not held in tribal casinos, according to a report from Madison-based Isthmus.com.
A group of poker players had challenged the legal status of poker since it is a game of skill, but Circuit Judge Richard Niess ruled against them, citing a Wisconsin Supreme Court case from 1964 that saw poker considered gambling.
In that decades-old case, a bar owner’s conviction for running poker tournaments was upheld.
Niess reportedly was sympathetic to the argument that poker is skill and should be legal, but he said that “he can’t ignore the law.” He said the game is “as much a part of the American fabric as baseball and apple pie,” but still issued a disappointing four-minute-long ruling.
Non-tribal run poker games do happen in the state since enforcement of the law is lax, the report said, but some are, rightfully, not happy with living with the possibility of getting into hot water over hosting games that don’t even have a rake.
Players were asking the judge to issue a “declaratory judgment” that poker is legal.
An appeal to the Wisconsin Supreme Court could be in the works.
State-sanctioned gambling in Wisconsin is limited to tribal casinos, a lottery and charitable gambling.
The ruling in Wisconsin follows another unfavorable ruling for poker, this one in Idaho, earlier this summer. In July, a federal court upheld a previous ruling that poker rooms are illegal there, even on tribal lands.
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