No prison time for cheating gambler

EL CAJON  —  A high-stakes gambler whose winning streak in the early 1990s made him a Las Vegas legend was placed on probation for three years Wednesday for cheating at cards at Barona Casino.

Anarygyros Karabourniotis, 64, who goes by the name Archie Karas, pleaded guilty in October to one count of felony burglary, meaning he entered the casino intending to commit a crime. In this case, the crime was winning by fraudulent means.

The District Attorney’s Office accused Karas of marking cards at a Barona blackjack table in Lakeside last year. He won $8,000 in one sitting on July 26, 2013, and was arrested at his Las Vegas home two months later.

When sentencing Karas, El Cajon Superior Court Judge Daniel Goldstein explained that after a year on probation, Karas may ask the court to reduce his felony conviction to a misdemeanor, if he follows the rules, does not commit any other crimes and pays the $6,860 restitution he owes.

The casino determined that was the amount of profit he took home after playing blackjack that day last year, Deputy District Attorney Andrew Aguilar outside the courtroom.

Karas did not make a statement to a judge during the brief hearing. His lawyer, Jonathan Jordan, asked whether Karas would be able to return to his home in Nevada while on probation.

“He can go back to Vegas as soon as (the Probation Department) says he can go back,” the judge said, indicating Karas would have to follow an established procedure to transfer his supervision to another state.

Karas, a Greek immigrant who became a professional poker player, high roller and pool shark, gained international fame for turning $50 into $40 million during a winning streak that started in 1992. It became known as “The Run.”

By 1995, he had lost it all gambling.

Last year surveillance cameras at the Barona Casino caught Karas putting “subtle but distinguishable marks on the backs of playing cards,” so he could identify each card’s value before it was turned over, prosecutors said.

The Barona Gaming Commission passed the case to the California Department of Justice’s Bureau of Gambling Control, which coordinated the investigation.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board helped with the arrest. An investigator said last year that Karas had been arrested four times in that state and accused of cheating by marking cards, secretly exchanging cards with a partner or pressing bets, that is, increasing a wager after he already knew the outcome.

Aguilar said a probation report shows Karas has a 2007 misdemeanor conviction for burglary in Clark County, Nevada.