An Upper Michigan man described as a professional poker player has been sentenced to 12 months of probation for his short-lived attempt to open a social-poker club in Marquette, the Upper Peninsula's largest city. Joshua Thatcher, 42, of nearby Gwinn, pled guilty in December to a single count of operating an illegal gambling operation after his club, 906 Poker Social, was ordered to close by Michigan law-enforcement and gaming officials in July of 2021.
Thatcher had modeled his social-poker club on those that have emerged in Texas and several other states, which operate by charging set membership fees and hourly seat charges in lieu of collecting rake. The legality of such private and semi-private poker clubs has yet to be established at trial, and enforcement actions targeting them have occurred on a state-by-state basis.
Here, the Michigan Department of Attorney General and Michigan Gaming Control Board Criminal Investigation department launched an investigation into Thatcher's 906 Poker Social club shortly after it opened on April 1, 2021. Three months later, the club was ordered to close and enforcement officers seized all gambling equipment and money from the premises.
In addition to the probation sentence, Thatcher was also ordered to forfeit the seized equipment and more than $13,000 in cash either found on the premises or seized from 906 Poker Social's bank accounts. The seizure and Thatcher's arrest abruptly ended the club's brief existence. Thatcher had received advice from an attorney that his club's social-club approach did not violate Michigan law, and Thatcher's club even received positive mainstream press coverage from Michigan news outlets when the plans for the club were first announced.
