Subject: Tournament Organizer's stand on cheating Date: Mon, 13 Jul 1998 12:34:38 -0700 From: "Brian Chew (Neutral Ground - SF)" Organization: Neutral Ground - SF To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Frank, I am writing this post in response to the seemingly neverending occurences of cheating in Magic tournaments. As a tournament organizer, I view the specter of rampant cheating as the cause for the ultimate downfall of the sport. At some point, honest players will get fed-up with the cheaters and stop playing. Unfortunately, the DCI applies the criminal standard of beyond a reasonable doubt to convict a cheater and as a result reltively few people have been banned. At our facility we currently run all PTQ's, Pre-releases, Trials, Regionals and Grand Prix for the Northern California region. To address this issue we at Neutral Ground - San Francisco have decided to implement the following policies towards cheating. 1. We will apply the civil standard of "more likely than not" (i.e. 50.1% likely to be guilty) to those persons who are suspected of cheating rather than the criminal standard of "beyond a reasonable doubt". We will use the players past behavior history at our facility as additional circumstancial evidence. Anyone we determine to be a cheater will be banned for up to two years from our facility/tournaments. This ban will be in effect regardless of whether or not DCI bans the player. 2. If the DCI bans a players for for cheating, they will be banned for twice as long at our facility/tournaments. Hopefully, this policy will dissuade would be cheaters from cheating as a ban from our facility will effectively prevent a player from participating in any significant event for MTG in Northern California. We have already banned a highly ranked PT player for cheating from our store for a significant period of time and would not hesitate to ban anyone else. I would hope that other tournament organizers would take a similar stand. Remember, playing in Magic tournaments is not a right but a privilege. Brian Chew Level II Judge Tournament Organizer for Northern California Neutral Ground - San Francisco http://www.nground.com blchew@matchplay.com -------------------------------------------------------------------- Name: vcard.vcf Part 1.2 Type: text/x-vcard Encoding: 7bit Description: Card for Brian C