Police?

[cunningham22]

my regular group in MA wants to get some cash together and buy a set of custom chipcos and build/buy a felt & cushion table. the regulars will front the money, but we have some players who drop in frequently, though probably not enough to ask them for a $250 share. we play .5/1 nlhe, and we thought of putting in a small rake (i.e., $1 out of at $10 pot, $2 of a $20, $3 of $50, capped there) to cover some of our expenses and to provide beer/food, and only on nights when non-regulars are playing. if we keep the game small, we don't think we should have to worry much about busts, no?

[hoterdoc]

z,
i am guessing : north carolina?

[Zetack]

[ QUOTE ]
z,
i am guessing : north carolina?

[/ QUOTE ]

Good guess. Yes.

[Zetack]

[ QUOTE ]
my regular group in MA wants to get some cash together and buy a set of custom chipcos and build/buy a felt & cushion table. the regulars will front the money, but we have some players who drop in frequently, though probably not enough to ask them for a $250 share. we play .5/1 nlhe, and we thought of putting in a small rake (i.e., $1 out of at $10 pot, $2 of a $20, $3 of $50, capped there) to cover some of our expenses and to provide beer/food, and only on nights when non-regulars are playing. if we keep the game small, we don't think we should have to worry much about busts, no?

[/ QUOTE ]

I haven't the slightest idea what the law is in MA nor can I speak specifically to your situation. Certainly its always conceivable that a local law enforcement official would get a hair up his butt about poker games and start busting all the home games he can find, or that some officer has a grudge against one of your players or something unusual like that.

But if your situation is typical and you avoid things like advertising or sending out mass emails to players who aren't already involved in your game the chances of you getting busted seem incredibly remote.

I would worry more about the ethics of raking a game only when "non-regulars" are there. What happens to the rake, at the end of the night? Is it split among all the regulars who contributed to the table? If nothing else, if a non-regular finds out that the game is only raked when he is there he's going to find it awfully hard to believe that there isn't some possibility of cheating and colluding going on.

--Zetack

[Lottery Larry]

"it's no different than the millions of Superbowl bets and NCAA Brackets that everybody does"

What makes you think THOSE are legal?