An Austin-area cardroom banned a pair of alleged poker cheats.
Vlogger Anthony Martino recognized the two recently playing poker at The Lodge Card Club in Round Rock, Texas, and alerted staff.
Martino said poker rooms in Florida and California already banned Norberto Pardo, 49, and Yaiquel Mosqueda-Perez, 43, for working together to mark cards. Lodge staff inspected cards and found they were marked. Then, they escorted the duo out of the cardroom and told never to return.
In a video, Martino described previous encounters with the two at a cardroom in Tampa. According to Martino, the cheats always wanted to sit in seats one and six. They were even paying others in the game to trade seats.
“We knew that the two of them work together,” Martino said. “We knew that they would signal one another, try to trap people in between them for raises. But they played such bad hands, we didn’t care.”
Exposing Alleged Cheaters
After playing with the cheats in Tampa, he found social media posts from Kristy Arnett Moreno describing two Cuban players at Los Angeles’ Commerce Casino who were accused of marking cards. The two allegedly used long pinky nails to mark the side edges.
Martino said he shared that information with the poker manager at a Tampa Greyhound track but was pretty much dismissed. Two weeks later, however, Martino learned the track caught Pardo and Mosqueda-Perez caught marking cards. As a result, the staff banned them from the cardroom.
Martino believes the two are based out of Miami. They are rumored to also have existing bans in poker rooms in Illinois, Iowa, New Hampshire, Florida.
Martino Warned Other Rooms In The Area
After the incident at The Lodge, Martino said he drove to another large nearby cardroom to warn management there as well.
“Unfortunately, it seems that they’re still in operation all these years later,” the vlogger said. “They get banned from rooms, they just move on to the next room.”
PokerNews reported that Pardo had been arrested in 2022 for grand theft and possession of a controlled substance in Miami-Dade County, FL. The Florida Gaming Commission has permanently banned Mosqueda-Perez from all pari-mutuel facilities in the state.
The commission doesn’t have authority over the Seminole Tribe. Consequently, it’s unknown if they are banned from the tribal casinos as well.
After the video’s release, Martino said Pardo sent him a text message threatening him. Martino said one text read: “I’m just telling you, you fat mole, one day you and I will come face to face for slandering me, okay?”
The news follows a few recent cases of cheating, including an alleged scheme involving NBA players and coaches and organized crime. A Houston poker room also caught three men cheating using RFID cards.
