Deadly Underground Poker Games

Texas Shooting
On Wednesday, Charles Lineberry, 49, of San Antonio was taken to University Hospital as a result of a robbery. Lineberry was enjoying a game of poker when three masked men burst through the back door of the Texas home. Shots were fired and Lineberry was caught in the gun-fire. When officials arrived, Lineberry was found with two bullets in his chest.

The attacking men grabbed the money from the game and continued to harass the players by demanding them to empty their pockets. the three walked away with $3,000.

Florida Shooting
Unfortunately, that was hardly the first shooting taking place in the US, nor was it the first shooting involving a poker game.

Earlier in the week, 28 year old Duane Demaris Crittenden of Florida was charged with three accounts of first-degree murder after believing that he was cheated during a private game of poker.

It was the day after the game, on a Saturday morning, that Crittenden had killed Jerome Anthony Henry, 48, Richard David Smith, 50, and Robert Erwin Ford, 50, all participants of the alleged fraudulent game.

With a history of non-violent crimes in Florida and Georgia, Crittenden was found with money that he had supposedly removed from the scene, according the Puntam County Sheriffs Office. Crittenden's arraignment has been scheduled for March 19th and he is currently being held without bond.

Tragic End Game
In one of his online posts, from a successful and rather famous career in poker, Lineberry wrote that poker had to be legalized. These shootings represent the negative effects of forced upon, unprotected underground gambling.