I guess this is a follow up to my previous post on bad behaviour in California card rooms.
So Sunday I was out and about running errands trying to get ready to fly out of here on hey to sneak in a little poker since I was near Hawaiian Gardens and I didn’t feel like driving back home in the rain.
No waiting list for Omaha so I sit down and I think I was on my fourth of fifth hand at the table when all of a sudden a commotion erupts in the poker room.
This portly guy in his 40’s or so is being followed by about four security guards and the manager. The group stops directly behind me. Literally less than 6 feet from my chair. He starts yelling that he won’t leave. The manager informs him that he is now trespassing and he can either leave voluntarily or they’ll call the police and have him arrested.
I’m not sure if the guy was on drugs or just drunk but he won’t budge. He’s yelling and screaming and pacing back and forth and the security guards are mirroring his every move. More security shows up. I see at least one packing a handgun.
Whacked out guy takes a few mock throws at various security guards and the manager. He’s challenged them to fight but they seem to be keeping their cool.
Not getting the reaction he wanted the guy starts yelling out across the poker room, “Get the fuck out of here everyone. I’m going to blow this mother fucker up. Blow it the fuck up!”
So I guess he wasn’t happy with simple trespassing and decided to tack on making a terrorist threat onto the charges that would eventually come.
At some point he pushed one of the security guards and seemed like he was trying to provoke some sort of confrontation.
Out of nowhere, the shortest of all the security guards walks up to the guy and just plows the whacked out guy square in the neck. He stumbles a bit and all of the security guards jump on him and wrestle him to the floor. It still took several minutes for them to get cuffs on him but eventually they did and he was walked out of the casino in cuffs.
One of the funniest parts in all of this, at least to me, was when they had the guy pinned on the ground and the casino manager is yelling “If anyone takes pictures or video of this you’re out of here. No videos. No pictures!”
Some of the floor managers try to take control of the situation and tell players to go back to their seats and for dealers to keep dealing. But the guy’s still on the floor wrestling with the security so there’s absolutely no way that’s going to happen.
I gotta give it up to the Hawaiian Gardens staff though. Other than making me laugh with the ban on video and pleas to keep playing they handled everything in a professional manner. I probably would have stun gunned the guy the second he laid hands on one of the security guys but they were really making an effort in deescalating the situation without the use of force.