Professor ups the ante as jurors assess lady luck’s hand in poker
Professor Joseph Kelly said the complex game of bluffing and reverse bluffing depends on the ability of the player and not the luck of the draw.
The expert was giving evidence in defence of Derek Kelly, aged 46, of Greystones, Co Wicklow, who runs Britain’s biggest card club.
The Irishman is accused of making money from illegal poker games without a licence and his fate could decide the future of poker clubs across Britain.
Mr Kelly, owner of the Gutshot private members club in Clerkenwell Road, north London, argues that because Texas Hold’em poker is a game of skill it should be subject only to the same laws as chess and bridge clubs, which operate unlicensed.
Professor Kelly, an American expert in gambling debts and gaming law, ran the jury through the spectrum of Texas Hold’em poker terminology including ‘pot odds’, ‘bluffing’ and ‘reverse bluffing’.
“There is a consensus amongst them that Texas Hold’em requires the most amount of skill,” he said.
Professor Kelly referred to poker legend Roy Cooke, who said that players may get lucky over a few hands but give him a thousand hands and the opposition were “dead”.
“He was referring to how he would be able to assess players. Are they aggressive? Do they bluff in a way that will cause more harm than good?... you do not want to make a point of winning many poker hands.
“The skill thing for a player is to win the large pots,” he told the jurors, who also heard how poker players need to make quick mathematical calculations to decide whether or not to play a hand called ‘pot odds’.
Zeeshan Dhar, defending, asked: “Would you say that calculation is a matter of skill or chance?”
Professor Kelly replied: ‘You make it a matter of skill by making the right mathematical calculation... and you go from there.”
Derek Kelly denies illegally charging a levy on winnings and an entry fee to his private members club.
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