Weeks after a criminal court in Pennsylvania ruled on the side of the defendants based on the notion that poker is a game of skill, it has been reported that the assistant district attorney in the case has appealed the case to the State Superior Court. Much like in the ongoing Kentucky case, high level state courts will be making key decisions as to the nature and legality of poker.

The case of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vs. Diane A. Dent and Walter Watkins began in the Columbia Country criminal court, where the defendants were charged with 20 counts violating state gambling statutes by participating in a poker game. Watkins hosted the game in his garage, and Dent dealt the cards and, allegedly, accepted tips. Reportedly, players were encouraged to tip in lieu of a house rake, and the game became the target of local law enforcement.

Ultimately, the attorneys on both sides agreed that the primary issue at hand was whether or not Texas hold’em poker was a game of chance or skill. Judge Thomas A. James Jr. gave his decision to the parties on January 16, 2009, and ruled poker a game of skill, thus delivering a not-guilty verdict to the defendants.

In the judge’s decision, he cited Mike Caro’s book Caro’s Secrets of Winning Poker and noted that the wealth of information in more than 600 poker-related books pointed to poker as a game of skill. His four-pronged approach to the question of chance versus skill led to the conclusion that each player can exercise skill with available data to make informed decisions in poker, that skill governs the results, and participants in the game are aware that players can influence the game using those skills. He admitted that poker games begin with chance equally distributed among the players, but the outcome is determined by skills that include those of an intellectual and psychological nature, rules and mathematical odds, tells, actions like folding and raising, and money management.

“This court finds,” Judge Thomas wrote, “that Texas Hold’em poker is a game where skill predominates over chance. Thus, it is not ‘unlawful gambling’ under the Pennsylvania Crimes Code.”

Assistant District Attorney Thomas Leipold disagreed, and he has since appealed the case to the Superior Court, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

Pennsylvania law remains blurred with regard to poker’s place in the state’s gambling statutes. Another lower court recently ruled that several people accused of operating poker tournaments in fire halls were in violation of the state law because they took a percentage of the profits for personal gain. The attorney in that case will not appeal, leaving the Dent/Watkins case to go to higher court alone for a potentially precedent-setting decision.

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