Major Poker Tournament Gets Robbed
Written by Larry T, Wednesday March 10 2010
Professional poker tournaments across the world might want to start beefing up security after what happened over the weekend in Berlin, Germany. According to numerous eye witnesses, four armed gunmen stormed the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Berlin while some of the world’s top poker players were playing in a major European Poker Tour event.
Those who were participating in the €5,000 No-Limit Hold’em Main Event took off running towards the exits in an effort to avoid the gunmen. Cameras showed the security guards at the event fighting with the gunmen for a little bit before giving way to the group. This gave the robbers an opportunity to scoop up the €1.36 million prize pool before making their way out of the building.
After the smoke cleared, players started gradually making their way back to the room where the scene was full of toppled tables and chairs. Some players were so shaken up that they were given the option to get a refund on their €5,000 buy-in and drop out of the tournament. The €1,000 buy-in event was canceled too as a result of the robbery.
The whole incident will no doubt have a lot more professionals considering staying home to play texas hold em online. And it will definitely have a lot more major poker organization like the EPT, World Poker Tour, and World Series of Poker considering vamping up their security efforts in order to avoid anything like this in the future.
After all, it’s one things for people to raid some 10-person home poker game and take their money, but it is an entirely different thing to rob a huge televised event and take well over a million Euros in prize money. The whole thing might have lots of famous pros in Europe and other parts of the world re-thinking their decision to play in future live events.
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