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Message: [QUOTE="Grossberger, post: 1328574, member: 55797"] This is out of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Two robbers wielding assault rifles stole more than $11,000 Monday night from a Cleveland poker game, at least the second time this year that heavily armed stickup men have hit a high-stakes card game. The thieves forced seven players to take their pants off in a Lake Avenue apartment near the Lakewood border and doused them with pepper spray before fleeing with the cash and clothing. Poker games, particularly Texas Hold Em, have increased in popularity over the past decade. The rise has been spurred in part by the World Series of Poker, a televised event that pays out millions of dollars. With the increase in popularity has come an increase in stakes. Where neighborhood games used to feature nickels, dimes and quarters, some private games include players bringing thousands of dollars in cash. Criminals have noticed. Seven robbers knocked off a game in a Solon warehouse in April and took $75,000. Last month, police arrested the robbers, who also used assault rifles. A player from Monday night was at the Solon game and couldn’t believe he was once again staring at robbers with more assault rifles. Monday’s game was listed on a Web site dedicated to local poker games, and the man said he visited the host before the game to warn him about security and urge him not to advertise the location of the game. “I thought I learned my lesson,” he said. “I thought, ‘Here we go again.’ It’s been quite the months I’m having.” The host of the game declined to comment. Card games are legal in Ohio as long as the host doesn’t charge a fee or keep a percentage of the payout. The heist is under investigation. Detectives are not aware of other games being crashed by robbers, a Cleveland police spokeswoman said. A Cleveland FBI spokesman said the agency doesn’t investigate poker games unless they have extremely high stakes or are operated by crime syndicates. Monday’s robbery unfolded about 11:20 p.m. A police report and witness accounts gave this description of events: One of the seven players went outside to smoke a cigarette when a robber put a gun to player’s head. The gunman forced the card player to take the robbers to the apartment. Another card player heard a knock and opened the door. The suspects pushed the door open and ordered everyone to get on the ground and remove their pants. They then stuffed all the clothes, wallets and money into two bags. The suspects then marched the seven men into the kitchen and sprayed them with pepper spray. One of the players found the bags of clothes strewn on the Shoreway after police arrived. The men follow a card-game page, the Cleveland Poker Meetup Group, on a Web site called meetup.com. The site hosts social pages for different activities across the country. Another player said the men were scared when the robbers burst through the door. Most of the men knew each other except for two of the players, he added. “Everybody is close knit,” the 34-year-old man said. “We’ve all played together at one time or another. We were stripped down to our underwear.” [/QUOTE]

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