Lawyer: Trio sought police advice on poker games

A day after a Middletown couple and their housemate were arrested and charged with running illegal poker games out of their basement, the trio’s attorney said today their clients reached out to Middletown Police for advice on how to lawfully host poker games at their home some two weeks ago – a notion Police Chief Hank Tobin calls “totally inaccurate.”

“We’re not in the position of giving guidance to people conducting criminal activity,” Tobin said.

William Shane Anderson, his wife, Laurie, and housemate Matthew Balotin face numerous gambling and child-endangerment charges after Middletown Police stormed the home inside The Legends golf community Monday and shut down the operation that officials say hosted guests wagering on pots as high as $20,000, while being served alcohol by topless women.

The Andersons’ attorney Herbert Mondros said his clients are victims of a story blown out of proportion.

“The evidence will show that prior to Monday’s raid, Shane Anderson wrote a letter to Middletown Police Chief Tobin seeking guidance on the card game, and that he had several voluntary meetings and phone calls with the chief and detectives, who told Mr. Anderson that there was no problem with the weekly card game,” Mondros wrote in an e-mail.

According to the affidavit of probable cause written by detective Thomas Finch, the evidence Mondros referred to is Anderson leaving a letter with the police department on Feb. 6, and meeting with the police two days later to discuss his “love” for the game of poker and his goal of building a business around his hobby.

Tobin said the letter, which neither he nor Mondros could produce, was a copy of one that Anderson had distributed in his neighborhood, in response to rumors circulating about his poker gatherings.

“I got the impression that he knew he was under investigation and that’s what generated the letter,” Tobin said. “The fact that he came here ... didn’t relinquish the fact that [the games] were continuing to occur.”

“If someone is sitting in their basement playing poker, that’s not a crime,” Tobin added. “If they’re making money off it, then it is.”

The police investigation included surveillance of the scene by Finch as well as informants who had been in the card games. Tobin also said the games were held three to four nights a week, and attracted players from several states.

The Legends is a subdivision of more than 400 homes and town houses nestled around the private Frog Hollow golf course. Resident Don Loesch, who is president of the civic association, said he doesn’t know the Andersons and never went into their house.

“I don’t even play cards,” he said.

Another neighbor, Ed Colaprete, who lives on Weiskopf Circle, said he used to play in the neighborhood game occasionally, but stopped about a year ago.

“They started raising the bet and it stopped being a family gathering, and I left,” said Colaprete, who is also a candidate in the upcoming town council election. “It was too rich for my blood.”

Tobin said Anderson made money by taking a cut of the pots and used the profits to help finance his startup business, Elite Poker, which hosts poker tournaments at bars and restaurants.

Tobin said today that the raid of a high-stakes poker game in one of the town’s upscale neighborhoods may yield more arrests, depending on analysis of evidence taken from the home. Computers taken from the Andersons’ home were turned over to the Delaware State Police High Technology Crimes Unit, the chief said.

“We also took paper files that we’re in the process of going through,” he said.

News Added: 28 February, 2008

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