Original subtitles

,

New York City, it was --

it was I felt like I had been cheated.

How do I not know that all of this

is going on right under my nose?

Michael: Right now, how many illegal

poker games exist in New York City?

-All five boroughs? -Yeah.

More than I could count.

It's just about the action.

It's just about the...action.

I guess I fold.

I might as well give this money away.

If you take a huge group of people that play poker,

less than 5% will end up winners.

If you are not part of that small percentage of winners,

then you're a loser.

[ Door creaks open ]

Michael: Our goal is just to simply show the world

a window as to why people do the things they do,

where that desperation comes from.

It's like they say, when the system fails you,

you create your own system.

"Black Market," NYC, Vice, baby.

This is what we doing tonight.

I am about to be introduced to a whole 'nother city

that exists within the city that I was born and raised.

You know, growing up, I saw a lot of gambling

in my community.

Rolling dice, craps, cee-lo.

But, you know, that wasn't really my thing at the time.

I do know that a lot of people

get sucked into this underground gambling scene.

Why would you want to risk being robbed or shot or arrested?

I want to find out why so many people

are willing to risk so much.

Right now, I'm about to go meet up

with Christian Alexander. What's up, brother?

He's one of the kings of the night life in New York,

and he's about to take me to one of the most notorious

gambling spots in the city.

[ Cellphone dings ]

I just actually got a text, got the address.

So basically, you have to be on this list,

and you get a text giving you the whereabouts

and the dates of where this game's gonna be?

It's usually the day of.

It's hard to hit a moving target.

I'm a virgin to this world.

Tell me, what am I gonna walk into right now?

I think it's better if we just see it and experience it.

These are New York OGs.

These are not, like, amateurs.

So, bro, do I need to get frisked?

You already know. I'm a team player.

-Okay, my brother, I'm with you. -Third floor.

[ Door closes ] [ Footstep echoing ]

It's a thin line between crime and entertainment.

[ "Hundred Dolla Girlz" by Richard Charnock playing ]

-What's up, bro? -What up, homie?

Michael: What do you got going on here tonight?

What game is this? Blackjack? I need in.

Michael: It was legal for me to gamble in those rooms.

Hell, yeah.

What's the -- what's the minimum for the game?

$20? All right.

And what makes these games illegal

is not the fact that people are losing their homes

and their families and their kids' college tuitions

on some of these tables.

-What you doing, son? -Hit me.

Michael: What makes these games illegal

is when the house takes the cut.

They call it a rake.

Hit me.

I'm busted.

The house always wins.

It's just like Vegas.

We re in the business of pleasure.

Gamblin is pleasurable.

Women are certainly pleasurable.

So we, as entrepreneurs, said, "Let's put 'em all together."

You know, vice is vice, man.

That s in our natures.

Yeah, I'm putting $20, bro. I'm feeling lucky.

I feel that Brooklyn love.

Baby, I'm feeling lucky tonight.

Nah! Oh!

What did I tell you? I'm feeling lucky tonight!

♪♪

Michael: Everybody's in their own world

and having fun, and it was safe.

Not one argument, not one shove, nothing.

It was just pure love.

But make no mistake,

that party could have easily gone the other way.

Where there's darkness, there's danger.

America's full of gamblers.

Almost half the nation places

some kind of bet at least once a year.

I mean, there's casinos all over this country,

regulated and taxed.

But there's another side to this gambling world.

Right now, we're at a poker game,

an illegal poker game right here in New York City.

Man: $25 is the bet. It's $20 more.

I'm gonna watch a little bit, yeah.

We're playing 2-5, no limit.

Whatever's in front of you is in play,

so at any minute...

-It could happen? -It could be gone.

[ Laughter ]

What I don't understand is,

what is the excitement with the illegal thing?

Why not just go to Vegas and -- -It's New York, man.

Money here, finance. -There's a lot of money.

Michael: There used to be clubs like this all over the city.

Some spots had up to, like, 20 tables.

When the game got robbed in 2007,

that changed the New York scene forever.

A shooting at an illegal gambling site in Manhattan

leaves a 55-year-old man dead.

Michael: I caught up with this dude,

Robert Hanley, old-school New York.

He was playing at that game.

Boom! I hear the gunshot.

Then I see a guy laying on the floor,

bleeding pretty bad on the ground.

So, I actually stuck my fingers in his back

and grabbed the artery.

He lasted, I'd say, a minute and a half or so,

then he passed away right in my arms.

One of the guys that worked there says,

"Why don't you take him to the alley and throw him

out by the garbage

so they won't find his body in here?"

This is while the man's still alive.

I told him, "If you don't get the...out of here,

your body's gonna be behind a garbage can."

What kind of humanity is there?

He's thinking about money in his pocket.

How does that incident change the game for you

or for the game itself in general?

That place had ten tables.

There will never be another ten-table place ever again.

[ Buzzer sounds ]

When the games are too big, police started to raid them.

It was too much money going on in there.

Nowadays, the games are a lot smaller,

but one thing's for certain, two things for sure.

Those rooms are lawless.

♪♪

Stephen: There's a game running in New York City,

in some way 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

There's multibillionaires sitting in certain games.

There's drug addicts,

struggling to make 20 bucks playing in others.

How much money does that say?

I don't know. I don't know.

I'm bad with numbers. [ Laughs ]

You ain't that bad.

There's actual people that travel around.

They call them grinders,

and they go to all these different clubs,

and they grind it out.

Whales are people that are invited to these games

that have a ton of money

and don't know anything about poker.

And they go and they spend $60,000,

$70,000, $80,000, and they lose it all.

If you're a player, technically, by New York state law,

players are not considered doing anything illegal.

Michael: The men and women we see at that table,

they're just basically customers.

But now in here, this brother in here

is who the police are gonna want to get after.

This dude runs games all over the city.

This one just happens to be in the back of a pizza shop.

[ Cellphone rings ]

And don't have shit to show for it.

Michael: Fantastic. That ain't gonna hurt.

I don't know what the...I'm doing.

Man: There's faces in there?

Oh, I don't know. Is there?

A gambler, you'll bet on anything,

but the guy who cheats, you know,

that's a different mind-set.

See, the cheater, he's got a system.

He doesn't leave anything to chance.

[ Card shuffling ]

Michael: If you make money gambling, and you don't report it,

you're basically cheating the government.

That's where the problem is.

And if you cheat, you know how they go.

The IRS will pounce on you,

and you're gonna need a lawyer like Ed Hayes.

-=Hey, what's happening? -What up?

-How you doing? -I'm good. That's it.

Michael: Quintessential, classy, New York.

This is beautiful. That's for you, man. I'm telling you.

I think I need a topcoat in this.

Yeah, yeah, with a velvet collar,

maybe a black velvet collar or navy blue or green?

Oh, man.

That, as we say, is clean.

We got to talk. [ Laughter ]

I understand you also know a little bit

about protecting gamblers. -Yeah.

How much time can a person get for running a gambling ring?

Three years, five years is really a lot for gambling.

What you get the time for is laundering the money, all right?

If it's part of -- -Tax evasion.

Yeah, tax evasion.

When you have really a lot of cash,

you have to find ways of smuggling it out of the country.

It's tough.

-Wow. -Take a look.

This is a hybrid between a sport coat and an overcoat.

-Oh, man, that looks beautiful. -This is dope.

This is dope, let's get fitted.

$3 million would be way too much

to try to -- -Look, you can launder it.

You just need the right people to handle it for you.

And you always take a risk 'cause the guys

that are doing it for you might get locked up, too.

Or -- or run off. Well, then they'd -- you'd kill them.

Yeah, yeah. You know, or kill somebody they know.

So, for that kind of money, somebody gets killed.

First rule of criminality is, beat people out of money,

somebody's gonna get hurt.

It's the guys that never want to quit,

that always want to make another score

that end up doing life in prison.

You pick a life of crime, it's risky.

Some people say, you die in prison,

or you die in the street.

It's the choice that you make.

Yeah.

Michael: So, right now, we -- we in Brooklyn.

We're gonna meet a man named Chummy

who used to run a very lucrative poker game.

What's going on? How's it going? Hey. Respect.

I've been involved in this for about 15 years. Okay.

You know, give or take. I knew the owners here.

I said, "Let me do a game in the basement."

We worked out percentages. He said, "Do it."

-Let's take a look at the spot. -Absolutely.

So this is where the magic happens, huh?

I mean, it looks pretty gritty down here,

and the truth is, even back then,

it was pretty gritty.

But, uh, the most important thing

is the money on the tables, so...

guys will play...anywhere.

Is it just the thrill of winning,

or is it the thrill of knowing

that you could flip money really quick?

All of it? All of it. All of it, and it is an ego thing, too.

-Oh. -Gamblers have big egos.

When you win, you feel like a...genius.

Yeah, yeah. You feel like a...genius when you win.

On the flip side, when you lose,

you hate yourself so much.

There's no in between because a real degenerate gambler

doesn't want to win a little.

He either wants to win a lot or lose a lot.

Most of these guys would rather lose a lot than win a little.

-You ever got robbed? -This place never got robbed.

We kept it discreet enough.

Some of the other places got robbed by --

-What was that like? -I was dealing.

There were ten tables full.

Two guys came in with guns, kicked the door open.

Like, "Everyone on the floor, everyone empty your own shit." Yeah, yeah.

Everyone, run your shit. Put it on the table.

A bunch of guys put up jewelry, shit like that.

They got the cage -- I believe that night,

they got the cage for over $100,000.

With all the players, you know, one guy was getting the cage

while the other guy was going table to table.

Everyone, you know, put their shit on the table. Jewelry and what have you.

Me, I was having a bad week that week, and I was dealing.

I needed my...money. I had like maybe $500 on me.

I took it out of my pocket, I put it in my drawers.

I dig it. And then I just threw my wallet on the table.

I had $8 in my wallet.

The guy actually looked at my wallet.

He said, "$8, mother...?" -Yeah.

But he didn't run my drawers or nothing, so...

-No, yeah, yeah, yeah. -I left with $500 that night.

♪♪

Most of the time, it's an inside job.

Michael: Right now, we are in Brooklyn.

We're about to meet a couple of dudes that --

they rob poker games.

Michael: Why do you only target illegal games?

What is your main -- what -- what is the science behind that?

Yes, sir.

What's the biggest lick you ever caught?

One game, one poker game, just wanted their cash, and --

$140,000?

-Yeah. -Yeah.

I mean, for what, for 5 minutes of work? Yeah.

Like -- like, how do -- how do you sort out the games

that you think are easy prey?

I mean, the reality is none of them are easy prey.

How many games have you robbed?

Mm-hmm.

-How much money? -Hood money.

Yes, sir.

Have you shot someone in a robbery?

[ Indistinct conversation ]

Michael: So when you're a degenerate gambler,

nothing is sacred.

Man: You want another $500?

-I got it. -Let's do it.

My boy needs a rebuy.

I might as well give this money away.

I fold. I fold. Fold. Hey.

Michael: When it gets to that point, you know, you're an addict.

That's the equivalent of someone

who can't control their drug habit.

$900 to a stack, it goes quick.

I could have easily sat there another however --

for however long it would have taken for me to blow all of that

because the game is so much fun.

You get very easily sucked in.

What's up, brother?

Chummy is a degenerate gambler.

So, what's this?

So, this used to be the Genoa Club, actually.

The entrance was right here.

There's an old saying --s one is too many,

and a thousand is never enough.

And if you know what I'm talking about,

you know what I'm talking about.

Running your games, were you also participating in them?

Yeah, and that's always been a problem of mine.

What's the old saying?

Never get high on your own supply, huh?

Never get high on your own supply.

-And with gambling, the chips -- -Shout out to Biggie.

The chips are the supply.

Gambling is certainly an addiction,

and most people -- it's hard to beat,

because it's not an outside chemical

or an outside agent that you're putting in your body.

It's already in you, and --

and it's just triggers to get it out of you.

It's just anything from just seeing a deck of cards

to seeing poker on TV to seeing sports

and just wanting to gamble on it.

You have money in your pocket, that's a trigger in itself.

Just give me, like, one play.

I can't even put anything in. I just want to see if it hits.

I mean, I don't have any concept of... --

you know, you don't think I'm a little --

I used to make all sorts of...crazy money,

all sorts of...whatever.

I was -- I was a figure around that world.

At a certain point, I had to realize I can't handle it.

Other people might be able to handle it.

Other people might be able to control it.

I'm not one of those people.

I am powerless over my addiction. Yes, sir.

You have to come to that realization. Mm-hmm.

And it's been a few months now.

I take it day by day. That's just all it is.

-I can -- I can relate to that. -You know?

Over my career, I've probably lost over $2 million.

My last 100 bucks that I ever lost was more painful

than, like, losing a couple hundred thousand.

Because when you hit zero, it becomes reality.

And then when it's just, you can't borrow anymore...

...y-your reputation goes to shit.

You lost a lot of friends.

A lot of family won't talk to you.

I know that I didn't gamble today. Yeah.

I don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow. Tomorrow.

Being, um -- being someone w-who is a recovering addict,

I can definitely relate to, you know, owing money

to different various dealers

and losing the respect and the trust of my family.

You know -- you know what they say,

you know, by us telling our story,

maybe someone will hear this and not make

the same stupid mistakes that you and I made.

So, you know, that's what it's all about,

you know what I mean? -Yeah.

It makes me realize that, you know,

there's a lot of addicts running around New York, man.

A lot -- a lot of gambling addicts.

It's a lot of, you know, venues that feed that need.

Those rooms can become portals to the dark side very quickly.

They're dangerous.

You know, it's lawless -- wild, wild west.

This country is kind of like -- it's built on that, isn't it?

You know? Yeah.

[ Laughs ] It's in the DNA.

Speakeasy, the back door,

you know, the -- you know, I got a little secret.

Don't tell nobody. [ Imitates whispers ]

We all like that shit. You know what I mean?

But, uh, you got to be careful because, you know,

unfortunately, that's -- that's --

where there's darkness, there's danger.

♪♪