A California man has cut a deal with prosecutors after being accused last year of cheating Chicago-area casinos out of $219,000. On Friday, Jianchu Liu, 48, pled guilty to a misdemeanor theft charge after facing a felony count of cheating in a gambling game.
Liu was first charged with conspiring with at least one accomplice to defraud the new Bally’s casino in River North and the Hollywood Casino Aurora between September 12 and November 26, 2023.
According to court records, Judge Laura Ayala-Gonzalez ordered him to pay $10,000 in restitution to Bally’s and placed him on a 12-month conditional discharge.
In February 2024, Liu was arrested for allegedly cheating at a casino’s baccarat table in Pennsylvania. According to Casino.org, security personnel at the Mohegan Sun casino in Wilkes-Barre focused on Liu after he launched an app on his phone at a baccarat table and darkened the screen so they couldn’t see what he was doing. According to the site, he buried the phone beneath a stack of scorecards used by baccarat players to keep track of their games.
When a dealer offered Liu the opportunity to cut the cards, he allegedly manipulated the deck by quickly fanning it out so his phone could record a photograph of the card values and sequence.
Liu walked away from the table after having a “verbal exchange” with a baccarat dealer regarding how to handle the deck, according to Casino.org. Several days later, Liu reappeared and allegedly “attempted to forcefully fan [out]” a deck of cards.
According to the gaming news outlet, investigators suspect Liu communicated images of deck sequences to an accomplice, who reviewed the shots and gave Liu betting instructions via a disguised earphone.
Casino security identified him using his loyalty card and discovered he was suspected of being a member of a “professional cheating ring” that defrauded two casinos in Biloxi, Mississippi.
Days later, accusations about the new Bally’s casino downtown led to Liu’s detention at O’Hare Airport.
If Liu successfully completes his probation, the misdemeanor case will be withdrawn.
He was at least the second individual to face criminal charges for cheating at the Chicago Bally’s casino since its opening in September 2023.
Prosecutors charged Isaias Garcia-Martinez with placing a 200-to-1 bet on a Bally’s baccarat table after the cards had been dealt and the outcome of the hand was known. The dealer, unaware that he had placed the bet after the game had ended, paid him $5,000 and walked away, according to the charges.
When he returned to the casino two days later, gaming agents apprehended him. Garcia-Martinez pled guilty to felony theft last year and received two years of probation, according to court documents.
