You dont understand how this works. The police were called. You reported the assault to the police. They made a report and now the ball is rolling.

What do you think happens when someone reports an assault to the police? The cops come out and make a report and that's the end of it? What do you think happens next? The report just goes into a pile and nothing else happens?

I don't think he had to. He was already gone when the cops arrived and only got a call the next day from somebody else that got injured. That guy asked him if he was injured and told him to see a doctor to have that documented. Couple days later cops interviewed him very briefly and he handed them the stuff the doctor gave him. No idea what happened after that, but maybe around a year later he texted me to ask if I remembered that incident and told me that he got $2k for it.

How do you reach that conclusion? You highlighted his second paragraph, but completely ignored his first paragraph where he stated that in the particular instance described by the OP, he would in fact definitely press charges. His second paragraph merely describes a fight with both parties participating. That's quite different from an assault committed by one individual.

IOW, he made my point, not yours.

Are you allowed to ask him for money in exchange for not pressing charges? What about in exchange for tipping the dealer $100 as compensation for lost tips due to a disturbance that led to fewer hands dealt, plus a round of drinks for the table?

Pretty sure that's illegal itself. Extortion, right?

Thats called extortion and is illegal.

Well, I wouldnt fight back inside my poker room ether because I wouldnt want to get banned. I assumed that was his reasoning since he said he would be more likely to fight back in the parking lot. I guess my point is that you dont fight back AND press charges. You do one or the other and the younger generation has been taught not to fight. The older generation took care of their own problems. We could argue all day long whether or not that is better or worse.

A lot of people responded to me, and rather than quoting them all I'll trust they can figure out who I'm responding to.

The main divide here isn't old vs young but "people who have seen actual **** go down" vs "people who take getting punched in the face way too seriously."

It's a poker room. People are drinking and emotional over losing money. It's like a bar or club or anyplace where people do stupid **** and the next day wake up and wish they could take it back. And you as a non-idiot in the bar/club/poker room have to be the bigger person more than your fair share of the time.

There's another divide here - "people who realize the psychopath will know your real name and potentially hunt you down after he's released if you press charges" vs "people who somehow think this is going to lead to the psychopath getting locked away in maximim security prison for the rest of his life."

There are times when you want to go to the mat for justice. Guy hits kids? Take it to the ends of the earth, at any cost. Guy pulls out a weapon? Reasonable to want him to get butt raped. Guy cold clocks random people walking to work on a Tuesday morning? He needs professional help.

Guy grabs you after you swear at him in a poker room? This is a problem that can be fixed with a handshake and a $5 beer.

Also ask politely when you want people to do you a favor. Even when it's not a favor at all and you're totally entotled to whatever you're aski g for.

I take being physically attacked seriously, I agree there are worse crimes but if you assault me as described by OP, you can forget winning me over with a beer and a handshake.

I think I can simplify this action into poker

OP "**** you man"- bluff
"what did you say"-call

"you heard me"- bluff shove

You got called op, pressing charges seems silly to me. What kind of response do you expect from a casino random? He could be on super tilt. Hopefully you both learned a lesson as you both made mistakes

Are you sure that's not more of a "guy who posts poorly on an internet forum" kind of punishment?

EDIT- Finished reading the previous posts. I was pretty wrong. I assumed it wasn't very forceful, but if there's noticeable marks days later that's significant. I'd probably still not deal with pressing charges knowing he got perma-banned. Do make sure there was an incident report, just in case.

I do wish people could just square up and settle things sometimes. That's not the state of things here anymore though.

I commend your restraint op. I like to think I could do likewise in that spot, but who knows.

Did the poker room follow-up with you to tell you that they banned him?

If everyone hates me for doing the right thing, this is too bad for everyone who hates me. I have principles.

People who overreact and assault people need to be disciplined and penalized. This is a deterrent for them, and for others who might be tempted to attack people unnecessarily in the future.

in real life you are going to find people that will get will pissed off from being told that. and yes occasionally they will get physical or threaten it. dont ever curse at a stranger. sooner or later it will bite you badly. same as flipping someone off.

of course op is right but did the wrong thing. and people have been killed for less.
and pressing charges against an aggressive stranger might make you have to watch your back for a long time and not worth it.

It was no bluff. I'm fairly certain I would have wiped the floor with him in a different environment. He is an angry little man.

He never should have reached in front of me and pushed my chips. It was not a casual move, it was an explosive aggressive action on his part. I'm pretty sure he was running bad and let his anger out on me, but that's no excuse.

His assault was also an explosive aggressive action. But I would liken it to being bit by a chihuahua. He wasn't really hurting me, so I was able to restrain myself. If he was hurting me, or he hadn't been pulled off me as fast as he was I would have had no choice but to start whaling on him. His position with his arm out and his hand on my neck left him wide open to a counter attack. I'm really glad security was there to get him off me, as I don't relish the idea of hurting anyone.

The threat was the clincher for me on calling the cops.

Yes, I was told the next day that he was permabanned.

In real life you are going to find that people will get pissed off when you reach in front of them and shove their chips. The F you man was an instantaneous response to his action. I think I said it pretty calmly even, kind of like the big Lebowski would have.

I cannot recall the last time I cursed at someone, it must have been decades ago.

As far as watching my back, I'm not particularly worried. If something happens, it happens. I don't live my life in fear.

From an old timer…

Kids, in the olden days, there were things called “fighting words”. If you insulted someone’s mother or wife or told them f*ck you, you could expect a physical response. Saying such “fighting words” to a total stranger might even result in you getting your ass kicked.

Nowadays, in the interweb era, as another poster pointed out, people can post any words to anybody and expect zero physical response. Not surprisingly, people tend to post ‘f*ck you’ to strangers on the web with great frequency.

I have two opposite and conflicting reactions to your situation:

1. OP, someone assaulted you and, for the good of society, you need to press charges. He's a danger to all of us.

2. OP, you told a total stranger “f*ck you”, and you didn’t get your jaw broken or your teeth knocked out or your head bounced off the ground; you got pinched on the neck. Son, you got off light. Since the guy got permabanned, let it go and don't press charges; life is too short to have some psycho stalking you for vengeance over charges filed for a pinched neck.

society has shrunk to a new low when mere words justify assaulting someone.

in your world someone cheering for the opposing team in a football game would give everyone the right to assault them .
its mere words.
and as for op being blamed for wanting more room , why is the offender taking up more than one spot not to blame ? shouldn't the offender have the manners to say sorry for taking up your space; let me move.

and he got banned because of the incident and could stalk the op anyway, pressing charges and facing a judge is just the wakeup call this putz needs

You have to give respect to get respect man... I've come up to a table before and could barely fit into my spot and the person who was cramping my space looked very intimidating, 300+ lb, big black guy with tattoos, looks like he could be a bouncer for sure, not someone who I would ever mess with, but as soon as I sit and can barely fit I say something like "hey boss could you slide over a bit for me" and he obliged. It also helps to be personable with the people who you are trying to take money off of. Had I come up to the table, not interacted with anyone, and the first thing I said upon sitting down is "dealer, square up the table", I imagine I would give off some negative vibes.

I'm not defending at all what that guy did, and that's a huge outlier as I've never seen anything like this happen live, but I just think it could've been avoided had you showed him some respect upon sitting down and just politely asked him to move yourself.

And a couple of years before you were born, hanging was the punishment for stealing horses. You might be surprised to see what happens if you tried that today. Times have changed.

What kind of argument is that? People are getting killed for going to the church on Sunday.

I agree, OP wouldn't have gotten off so easy in the good old times of martial law.

This leads to my reasoning that younger people are less likely to fight back and more likely to press charges. Times have changed. The older guys wouldve been more likely to fight back and then be done with it because thats how these things were handled when they were younger before times changed

I did say please

I have seen angry reactions and a fight involving this guy before. He is not someone I would ask directly. With a guy like him, the proper way to do it is ask the dealer nicely to square the table imo.

On the other hand some of the biggest, most intimidating (to some people) guys like you describe that I see regularly are people I probably would ask directly. Chances are it wouldn't even be necessary to ask.

I am pretty good with people, I used to be in sales. I have a generally friendly demeanor and have no problems striking up conversation with people. It has been years since I've even argued with anyone at the table.

I respect you guys opinions, some of you feel I started it by saying F You man. But in my opinion he started it when he pushed my chips.

If I could go back, I might say something different? But I don't think my response was out of line at all given what he just did.

I'm fairly certain that if we were in a different situation (with no security nearby) I would have beat his ass for grabbing me like that. But I would not have felt good about it.

1) Gregs post /thread
2) Probably not a good idea to say "**** you" to strangers, especially ones that could be losing money
3) Lol at the victim blaming tho
4) I predict 5 page thread

You have not cursed in a decade and this event broke your streak? I call bullpoop. OP not telling the whole story......