Concerning Gabriele Pisicchio

I will try and make this brief, (in fact I would rather not write this
letter at all) but I feel there are some things that need to clarified
to the Magic Community and the Italians that feel they have been slighted.

As a side note to Italians reading this let me point out that I harbor
no ill will to Italians in general - quite the opposite:  I was in love
with one for a short time and one of my best friends' wife is Italian
(who I care about very much.)

I don't claim to know the truth of all the events that have happened to
Mr. Pisicchio at Worlds but I don't think that it really matters.  I am
going to restrict my comments to what I have read by Mr. Pisicchio's and
published information about DCI rules.
http://www.wizards.com/DCI/MTG_DCI_Unirules.html

First indulge me by reading the following 2 quotes from the Floor Rules:
   Quote 1:
   All players must obey the current official tournament rules applicable
   to the tournament type in which they are competing. If a player has a
   rules question, he or she should communicate it to the other player
   and judging staff in a concise, polite, and rational manner.

   Quote 2:
   Cheating will not be tolerated. The head judge reviews all cheating
   allegations, and if he or she determines that a player cheated, the
   head judge will issue the appropriate penalty based on the DCI penalty
   guide. All tournament disqualifications are subject to DCI review, and
   further penalties may be assessed.

   Cheating includes, but is not limited to:
     -Receiving outside assistance or coaching
     -Looking at opponents' cards while shuffling or *cutting*
     -Scouting other players' cards
     -Misrepresenting cards
     -Underpaying mana
     -Using marked cards/sleeves
     -Intentionally marking cards/sleeves during play
     -Drawing extra cards
     -Manipulating which cards are drawn from your *deck* or your
      opponent's deck
     -Deliberately stalling the length of a turn to take advantage of a
      time limit
     -Intentionally misrepresenting *public information* (life totals,
      number of cards in library, and so on).

The point of showing the first quote is simple - it is Mr. Pisicchio's and
only Mr. Pisicchio's responsibility to not cheat (this means he should
"know" what cheating is... and make sure he does not partake of it.)

Now lets take a careful look at the 2nd quote.  I would like you to take
careful note of the following lines:
     -Using marked cards/sleeves
     -Intentionally marking cards/sleeves during play
You will note that both marking cards and using marked cards is considered
cheating - There is NO issue of intent here.... if you are using marked
cards you are cheating.  Thus the DCI does not care if Mr. Pisicchio marked
his cards on purpose or not - they were marked.

How do you tell if a deck is marked?  It is simple really - you look at
the back of the deck and if you able to pull out a sub-set of the cards
that are the same then it is marked.  Thus it is clear to me that the
judges were able to pull all the lands out of the deck simply by looking
at the back of the cards.

There is another point I feel needs to be made.  I quote Mr. Pisiccho here:
      If I separate lands and spells in two piles, for riffle shuffle
      together, and I do the same pressure on both piles, the pile with
      less cards is bent more than the other... a bit more, but If I do
      the same procedure for 8-9 games probably the lands are a bit more
      bent than the spells. It's the only way for explain the accident,
      because I know well in my heart that I do nothing of voluntary.
What Mr. Pisiccho is talking about here is separating his lands and spells
between each match and then reshuffling till he is happy with the result.
This means that he shuffled 17/24 in one shuffle for 6 or 7 rounds - this
does not seem to me to be enough to warrant more bent cards.

Finally, let me tell you of a personal experience I had with Mr. Pisicchio.
At the last Pro Tour NY, I was playing in the team tournament against an
Italian team.  Mr. Pisiccho came over and started to talk to our opponents,
clearly telling them how to play their cards.  We had to ask him several
times to go away.  They all claimed he was not talking about magic but in
fact one of my teammates knew enough Italian to clearly hear words having
to do with magic.  At this time I would like to quote the DCI floor rules
to Mr. Pisiccho (in case he is unfamiliar with them):
     -Receiving outside assistance or coaching
Of course he could claim he was off the hook because he was giving the
assistance but as far as I am concerned Mr. Pisiccho got what he deserved -
no more, no less.

Hogan Long
Team Grumpy Old Men, NYC '98